


In Your Eyes

by unknowableroom_archivist



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Gen, Marauders' Era
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2007-06-12
Updated: 2007-11-15
Packaged: 2019-01-19 21:29:02
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 13
Words: 138,424
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12418530
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/unknowableroom_archivist/pseuds/unknowableroom_archivist
Summary: "By then it was already too late.  It's not even strange that everything came to a head at once.  Our lives were too tightly entwined for isolated tragedies, much less deaths."  A shifting perspective look on the last week of the Potters life and everything, in laughter and tears, that led up to it, from the eyes ...





	1. With New Eyes

**Author's Note:**

> Note from ChristyCorr, the archivist: this story was originally archived at [Unknowable Room](http://fanlore.org/wiki/Unknowable_Room), a Harry Potter archive active from 2005-2016. To preserve the archive, I began manually importing its works to the AO3 as an Open Doors-approved project after May 2017. I e-mailed all creators about the move and posted announcements, but may not have reached everyone. If you are (or know) this creator, please contact me using the e-mail address on [Unknowable Room collection profile](http://www.archiveofourown.org/collections/unknowableroom).

  
Author's notes: 1  


* * *

**Prologue**

**With New Eyes**

 

            Remus Lupin knew that it would be hard to see Sirius Black again.  In the Shrieking Shack, it had been pure joy to meet his old friend again.  The radical change of his perception of him had been a relief at the time.  Seeing the drastic changes in his appearance had not fazed him, really.  The pain that Sirius had caused him was forgotten in the happiness of seeing him again and the burning anger and purpose they both shared to destroy Peter.

            Now, the light of reunion and the fire of purpose had darkened and cooled.  He would face a man of whom he had thought the worst for twelve years and who had thought worse of him than anyone else in his life.  The fact that they had both made the same colossal mistakes did not make it any easier to get over them.  It made it harder.  They could understand how the other had made the mistake, but that only made the wall between them wider.  They knew how hard it had been initially to believe that their lifelong friend had betrayed them.  They also knew that when they had stopped believing in their friend, they had taken the easy way out.

            Yes, this meeting was entirely different from the first, where the things that they had done to each other could be so quickly and easily swept aside.  Sirius’s mistake had killed Lily and James, and had been the final nail in the coffin of the Marauders, had been the reason that none of them came to the funeral of Remus’s wife.  Remus’s had doomed Sirius to Azkaban without even a trial in which to try to clear his name and warn about the terrible danger to Harry.  Remus’s mistake had put Harry Potter in almost continual danger for three years.  Remus’s mistake had allowed Voldemort to return again, witnessed by the son of Lily and James.

            They had both made the same mistake, so they knew that it had been made not because they had no choice.  They had taken the most obvious choice, the easiest choice, the path of least resistance.  In the process, they had chosen not to believe their friend.

            That was why Remus brought Mundungus Fletcher with him.  Partially, it was because he knew that Mundungus deserved to know the truth about Sirius and what had really happened to Lily, James and his sister and because of whom.  It was high time that he was told the truth, and it might even help to get him to join the Order.  Mostly, however, Remus didn’t know if he dared face Sirius alone, especially this first time.  This first meeting when their sole purpose would be to see if the bonds that they once thought death could not break had been shattered by distrust.

            They had both delayed a full year.  At first, it had been because Sirius was in hiding and Remus knew that he would be watched – very closely.  He sometimes amused himself by losing the tail that the Ministry had set on him.  More often, he would walk right up to his tail and engage the awkward Auror in pleasant conversation.  At first, it had been old hands that almost convinced him that it was just a coincidence, or would have if he hadn’t grown up around perhaps the five most skilled liars of their generation.  They had, individually and collectively, fooled Voldemort, Lucius Malfoy, Albus Dumbledore, Alastor Moody, and each other.  Eventually, the Ministry set rookies to watch him, realizing that if he knew where Sirius Black was, he was too smart to visit.  Those were entertaining.  Remus found it endlessly amusing to be the first beat for new Aurors.

            Remus and Sirius had exchanged messages.  For those, Remus used Mariella Goring exclusively.  He and Sirius had both taken to the fellow unregistered Animagus, a snowy white post owl. Dumbledore also used her as an undercover guard for Harry Potter and to send any communications that he didn’t want the Ministry to intercept.  Mariella Goring knew how to lose Ministry owls, and ever since Hagrid had given her to Harry as a “pet,” Ministry goons usually didn’t dare to try to track her.  Ironically, she was related, distantly, to the witch for whom Harry had decided to name her.

            Even when Sirius came back to England, even when Remus knew that he had lost his tail for the moment, knew that it would be safe to Apparate to see Sirius even if just for a few minutes, he hadn’t.  Sirius hadn’t sought him out either.  Not until the Order took up residence in Grimmauld Place, and they knew that their excuses had run out.  In lieu of an excuse to delay the meeting with the friend he had wanted to see for so long, Remus brought back-up.  If they had a common purpose, perhaps the first meeting wouldn’t be so awkward.

            The young man had not come eagerly.  “Young” was, of course, an adjective few used for Mundungus Fletcher, because few would guess his true age.  He dressed in shabby clothes that hid almost everything about him and certainly had enough con stories to create the impression that he was twice his age.  He kept a healthy layer of dirt on his unlined face and young hands.  But he couldn’t have fooled many eyes, truly, if the mind and heart of all who saw him didn’t want to believe, fiercely, that a man so young couldn’t possibly hold this much bitterness and anger in his heart.  Mundungus reeked of bitterness.  The air around him sometimes practically tasted of it.

            At moments, it was almost impossible not to compare him to his sister.  Their temperaments were actually very similar, but she had never allowed hers to be clouded with so dense a shroud, even when she walked through the valley of the shadow of death, even when she moved among those who were evil and cold and heartless.  Seeing him with his few friends, kindred spirits (future con-men) or impressionable minds never failed to remind Remus forcefully of the elder Fletcher.  Two months from now, seeing him with the Weasley twins (who were friends, con men and impressionable minds all rolled into two) would stop Remus dead in his tracks, every time.

            “This better not be about the Order, Lupin,” Mundungus told him gruffly.  “I really thought that Dumbledore was too smart to try to send _you_ to convince me.”

            This was definitely not one of those moments.  Remus almost wondered that he had agreed to come at all.  He had hoped more than expected Mundungus to answer his unexplained summons.  They had, for years, by mutual consent avoided each other’s presence.  They had blamed the gigantic fight that they had had, but they both really knew that that was the easy way out, the easy face to put on things.  They didn’t want to see each other because it was too painful for Remus to see how like his sister Mundungus could sometimes be and for Mundungus to see in Remus the many mannerisms he had picked up from his wife.

            Remus had known that they would have to restrain him when he first saw Sirius Black.  He nearly escaped them three times before they finally had a chance to give him a garbled version of the true story of that terrible week.  Then he sat still.  “Did Pettigrew kill her too?” was all that he said.

            Remus and Sirius looked at each other in surprise.  It was the first time in a year that their eyes had met, and the moment that it happened they seemed to slip back twenty years, when they were still a fellow Marauder in each other’s eyes, when they were the greatest of friends.  Or rather, they slipped back into the Shrieking Shack.

            “Well?” Mundungus demanded.

            “I know how to find out,” Remus said, a look of resolve coming into his eyes.  He strode to the door without further comment.

            Sirius Black turned back to the boy in front of him.  “Any idea where he’s going?” he asked him, wondering as he did so why it was so much easier to slip back into the old way of things with Mundungus Fletcher than with Remus.  Maybe because it was much easier to separate this bitter, twisted conman from the next generation Marauder (as Mundungus had dubbed himself) that he had known long ago.  Remus hadn’t changed much, really.  Only the way that Sirius saw him had changed dramatically.

            “Probably to get Mariella’s potion,” Mundungus said with a kind of shrug.  “She’s the one who invented the Wolfsbane potion, you know.  Remus was her test subject.  That’s how they met.”

            “What good will Wolfsbane do him now?” Sirius demanded, though he was utterly shocked by this information.  Mariella Goring was one of the two people in the world who had known where he had been hiding last year, and neither she nor Remus had mentioned how they had met.  Sirius had assumed that it was by virtue of her being Harry Potter’s owl.  It made sense, of course.  He knew Mariella well enough to know that she would never have said anything about it, either to brag about her accomplishment or possibly embarrass Remus by saying that he was the test subject.  Remus was also unlikely to bring it up.  Mariella was awfully young to have managed it, though.  Then again, that would explain why everyone talked about her potionmaking ability as if she spit Veritaserum.

            “That’s not the only potion she invented,” Mundungus said with a roll of his eyes.  “She’s offered this one to him several times.  She calls it the Thestral Caller.  She invented it by accident in the process of the Wolfsbane creation.  It allows you to see the death of the person closest to you, whether you were there or not, and, I suspect, whether or not they’ve already died.  She’s never admitted that, however.  She thought it might be good for Remus’s understandable complex if he could see if Marissa was already dead before he got to her.  The Aurors never were sure of that.  That’s why he wasn’t charged.”  From the sound of it, Sirius Black doubted that Mundungus Fletcher would have raised a hand to demand that Remus Lupin be given a fair trial if he had been charged for the murder of his wife.

            “By Merlin, I hope that she was,” Sirius muttered, settling back in a chair opposite the one where Mundungus was held by spells.  “I’ve always felt terrible about missing her funeral.  It was one of the things that I thought about most in Azkaban.  I should have been there.”

            “Yes, you should have been,” Mundungus told him bluntly.  “You know that she came back to England to see all of you one last time.  Even after she knew that you didn’t tell her about the Fidelius Charm.  She had faith in the friendships that you once had.  She could have lasted a few more weeks, maybe a few more months, if she would have just given up on all of you and stayed in the tropics where Remus tried to bring her.  You should have come to say goodbye at least.”

            “I visited her grave,” Sirius offered.  “The first thing I did after I had seen Harry.  I went fifty miles out of my way on the trip to Hogwarts.”

            “How could you have thought that she would betray you?” Mundungus demanded harshly.  “How could you doubt someone like her?”

            Sirius took a moment before he answered, but Mundungus was not enraged by the delay.  He was enraged that Sirius seemed to be looking back through the past, recalling the exact moment when he had decided that Remus and his wife were the traitors.  He thought that he had a reason.  He thought that there could possibly be a reason for thinking that Marissa Fletcher – she would never be Marissa Lupin to her brother – had betrayed all of the people that she loved.

            “The Saturday night just before all of the shit hit the fan, there was a moment, when we were all sitting up together late at night.  We all knew that it was unofficially the sort of ‘interview’ for Lily and James to make their final decision about their Secret Keeper, or rather whom to tell or not to tell as they told me later,” Sirius started his tale.  “There was a moment, around midnight, when we all had to finally admit that there was someone in the room who had betrayed us.”

            “How could you possibly think that it was Riss?” Mundungus demanded.  “Or Remus for that matter?  How many times did you, all of you, say that they were the best of you?”

            “Yes,” Sirius all but snapped at him.  “Remus was the conscience of the Marauders and Marissa was the angel sent down from heaven who loved everyone and whom everyone loved – at Hogwarts.  Hogwarts days were over.  They knew secrets of the Order and the Death Eaters, but they weren’t in the Order.  We all worked together, I was James’s partner and Peter was Lily’s.  Remus wouldn’t even tell us where he had gone or admit that he had disappeared when he was gone for days.  The only contacts that Marissa seemed to be keeping up were those of known and suspected Death Eaters.  They were even sitting a little apart from the rest of us.”

            “She was Dumbledore’s spy!” Mundungus burst out. “The best that he had!”  He made another desperate move to escape his bonds.  “And Remus was his top recruiter among Dark creatures – all magical creatures for that matter!”

            “I know that _now_ ,” Sirius snapped in annoyance.  “We didn’t know it then.”

            “They couldn’t tell anyone, they barely told me,” Mundungus replied.  “Not for two years did they tell me.  It wasn’t like it was for you. You just declared War and fought.  Even the others who remained anonymous did it for safety.  They still could have done their work if they had been found out.  But not Remus and Marissa.  If so much as the shadow of suspicion had fallen on them it would have been over – they wouldn’t have been able to do their work.  They couldn’t tell even you.  I remember a dozen times that they had almost decided to tell you, hurt by your distrust, but then something would happen to remind us that someone in our circle had turned traitor.”

            “I _know_ ,” Sirius cried in frustration, “ ** _now._** ”  

            “So that night, in your eyes they were traitors,” Mundungus said coldly.  Sirius nodded, looking down at the floor, no longer able to meet Mundungus’s eyes.

            Mundungus stopped for a moment.  He didn’t stop because Sirius’s explanation was satisfactory.  He had seldom heard something less satisfactory to him.  He stopped because before Sirius hid his face, Mundungus saw the tortured look in his eyes and the unbearable guilt that had settled on his shoulders long ago.  He could see, for one brief moment, the deep ruts that had marked his shoulders from so long of carrying the colossal load.  Mundungus knew at that moment that there would be nothing that Sirius Black would ever regret more than he regretted distrusting Mundungus’s sister and her husband.  No matter what other mistakes he was destined to make, that was the regret of his life.  So it was with a more halting and less accusatory tone that Mundungus continued, “and that’s what caused the events of that last week?”

            “Oh not you too,” Sirius muttered.

            “What?”

            “Remus sometimes says how frightening it is that all it takes is one bad week to utterly destroy your world, but I think that he knows better than that,” Sirius explained.  “I can’t say the same for you, but I think that Remus knows that the events of that week had been in the works for years, had their beginning perhaps as far back as our fourth year. It’s not even surprising that everything came to a head at once. The events of that week could never have happened one by one. Our lives were too tightly intertwined for isolated tragedies, much less deaths.”

            Sirius looked up and off toward the only window in the room, which was caked with a thick layer of grime, and again seemed to be looking far back into the past as he continued, “I just wish that I could say that we stood by each other in the time of trial, rather than that we were finally hit with one blow too many and broke apart. It was inevitable, though. We had changed too much in each other’s eyes. We were too different from the way that we looked in the eyes of those whom we loved best.  So yes, I looked at Remus and Marissa and saw traitors.  In my eyes, Peter was the perfect bluff.  In my meager defense, none of us showed each other who we were any more.  Lily and James and I did a little more than the others, but even then it was only among the three of us.

            “So of course the way that we saw each other started to change.  We stopped trusting each other.  Us.  The Fabulous Four and their Girl Fridays.  The Gryffindor Six.  We looked around at the group of people that we knew better than anyone else in the world and no longer saw each other as we truly were.  Once that happened, it was already too late.  After that, what happened next was inescapable.”

            They were both silent until Remus returned.


	2. Lucius: The Reason I Doubt You

**Chapter One**

**The Reason I Doubted You**

_In your eyes, I am insignificant._

 

            If he had a sickle for every person who thought that he was insignificant, Lucius Malfoy would have precisely one sickle.  It was perhaps the most infuriating and intriguing feeling that he had ever felt.  

            That was why he permitted the girl access to his home for so long, even when he began to suspect her.  That was why he had ordered his betrothed Narcissa to befriend her, to an extremely limited degree, when she told him in a letter that the girl had waltzed into the Slytherin common room on the arm of that greasy halfblood.

            Lucius Malfoy kept the girl in his life because she was the one who had taken the first nibble at his self-confidence, his unflinching pride.  She was, he had determined long ago, therefore the only one who could break the spell.  He had learned in the years that he had kept her on his radar and in the months that he had drawn her close, even in the few moments when he had tried to possess her, that she was no ordinary enemy.  So he had watched carefully, to learn how to defeat her.

 

~~~

 

            A blonde boy with cold blue eyes controlled Hogwarts during his seventh year.  He ruled the school with an iron fist, and it turned on his every whim.  In an atmosphere of fear and cruelty, he reached out one day to knock the books out of the hands of a first year.  He had no particular reason for it beyond that she was smaller, weaker and a Mudblood with the audacity to look happy as she chatted with another redheaded Mudblood.

            The little blonde girl did not shrink in fear or start crying as other victims had before.  She did not apologize and quickly duck down to pick them up.  She did not even stand up to him and demand that he apologized, as he half-hoped that someone would one of these days so that he could truly beat them down.  She just gave him a quick glance, looking him up and down and seeming to size him up.  Then she gave him a contemptuous look, as if she neither had any idea who he was nor cared, and bent down to pick up her books.

            It had filled him with rage such as he had never felt before.  Not because it had surprised him or even because she hadn’t reacted to his cruelty.  He had seen himself through her eyes for one infinitesimally short moment and it had been the most frightening moment in his dark life.  He had seen himself as an insignificant, puffed up boy not worth even a reaction from her – her!  A worthless Mudblood!  

            Lucius Malfoy did not like being frightened.  It was his first experience with it, and he did not handle it well.  He stood there, seething in deadly silence, until she had gathered all of her books again, chatting at the redhead who, like everyone else in the corridor, was mute and watching him.  She couldn’t be bothered.  Lucius reached out and knocked her books from her arms again.

            She granted him only another brief glance.  Then she turned away from him with the same dismissive air and bent down to pick up the fallen items.  He didn’t know what came over him at that moment, but he kicked out at her and sent the small girl sprawling on the ground.  He was not even rewarded with a cry as she hit the ground, and, judging from the sound when she hit the floor and the distance that her things went flying, she had hit it very hard.

            “Leave her alone!” the redhead cried suddenly, pulling out her wand.  She looked brave, but she was practically trembling as she stood up to the older boy.  That was fine with Lucius Malfoy.  She was no threat to him, and even she knew it, despite the determined look in her eyes.  He could handle that.  Things were back on his terms now.

            But then the blonde intervened.  From the floor, she just shook her head and said, “Don’t bother, Lily.”  Earlier, her look had been contemptuous.  Now, her tone was dismissive.  “He’s not worth it,” she told her friend, turning her back on him and reaching to pick up her things.  Even more than her words, the fact that she turned  her back on him stung Lucius Malfoy.  She didn’t fear him.  She didn’t see him as a threat at all.  She didn’t even regard him as an adversary, much less a worthy one or a superior.  A stupid little Mudblood!

            He stood there frozen and dumb in sheer disbelief and unspeakable anger.  Most of all, frozen with an unfamiliar sensation of raw fear that she was right.  A tiny seed of doubt, no larger than a gnat, crept into his soul, but it was no less nagging than one buzzing in his ear.  It would gnaw at him forever, sucking only a little blood at a time, but always a little bit more.  Every so often, the gnat would have taken a little too much for him to do his job, for him to achieve his ends.  The little gnat of self-doubt would buzz in his ear at just the wrong moment, and he wouldn’t be able to think when he needed to most.

            And the gnat would never buzz louder, would never suck so deeply, would never bite with such good aim, as when Lucius Malfoy had Lily Evans for his direct opponent.  Eight years later, when the little redhead who thought to defend her friend proved better than him in his area of expertise, in his gift to the Dark Lord, that gnawing little gnat of self-doubt would take deep draughts from the veins of Lucius Malfoy’s seemingly boundless confidence, from his unflinching pride.  The biting, relentless little gnat of self doubt which her friend had spawned would inflame Lily Potter’s every victory over him.  But even though Lily Evans could beat him, even though she was a stupid Mudblood who could do more than he could, his rivalry with her would never break his certainty the way that her friend’s casual dismissal had.  A quick look, a back turned, and the little gnat was born.

            It took its first taste of Lucius Malfoy as a tiny blonde girl calmly gathered her books, quills and ink from the floor of the corridor with her back turned to Lucius Malfoy.  The other students in the corridor slowly bent down and started to help her.  Lucius pushed his way through the crowd, sending other books flying as he went.  The gnat, in the meantime, had decided that it liked the taste of this boy’s perfectly pure but ultimately thin blood.

 

~~~

 

            Lucius Malfoy did not think of her constantly.  He did not even plot a revenge after he left that corridor.  He did not think of the incident, except once or twice a year in the dead of night when he could not get to sleep.  Then he would remember an aching feeling of unimportance, of insignificance, of inability to get what he wanted.

            But his life went on.  He continued his miniature reign of terror at Hogwarts as Head Boy and virtual king of the school.  He graduated and started to take over the family responsibilities from his sometimes willing and sometimes unwilling father.  He assumed his high place in Wizarding Society.  If he turned back to the Castle, it was to keep his eye on a very different blonde: his betrothed Narcissa Black.  He joined Lord Voldemort and began to build his place among the Dark Lord’s followers, rising ever higher and higher because of what his exalted, respected position could obtain for the Dark Lord and his sheer brilliance and power in charms.

            It was three years before he thought of that blonde first year again.  He had forgotten almost completely the girl who had dismissed him as if he were insignificant.

            Halfway through Narcissa’s sixth year, their courtship ritual began in earnest.  Once she came of age, he was expected to escort her to all necessary events, just as she was not to permit anyone else to perform the honor that belonged to her betrothed.  They would be married the week after she graduated from Hogwarts.  Some couples, even from the best families, had to wait these days.  The Malfoys and the Blacks did not.

            As Lucius sat with Narcissa in the Alumni box at the first Quidditch match of the spring semester, he was feeling supremely confident and proud of his place in the world.  A useful and beautiful woman was on his arm, and he had achieved a high position in wizarding society, only three and a half years out of Hogwarts.

            It gave him the start of his life when he saw the blonde girl in the Gryffindor stands.  She was easy to spot.  She was down on the lowest level leading the cheers that rose from the stands, and, of all the tacky members of her house who had draped themselves in their house colors with no regard to dignity, she was easily the most excessively dressed with the least consideration to taste.  

            The three years had aged her into something almost pretty – for a Mudblood’s rustic charm.  The escalating darkness of those three years had not tamed her audaciously happy demeanor.  Everything that had made him feel compelled to lash out at her in the corridor had only grown stronger and more obvious.  She was still small, still young, still pretty, and still ridiculously happy.

            Seeing her made him remember that momentary glimpse of doubt.  It made him wonder if he truly deserved his high place in society. Worse, it made him wonder if he had even truly assumed it or if the great men whom he thought he were befriending were merely condescending to him.  It made him turn to look at Narcissa’s ice cold hand on his arm and wonder if she was really pleased with the match their parents had chosen, if she really thought that she was marrying a great and powerful wizard.  It made him wonder if she really did think of herself as the luckiest girl at Hogwarts as she had said only a little while ago as she ascended to the Alumni Box on his arm.  It made him ask himself if she would have chosen him on her own.

            But then Slytherin scored a goal, and he gladly devoted his attention to demonstrating a proper display of house spirit.  Narcissa smiled broadly at him very winningly, and he nodded slightly at her.  Was she truly a Quidditch enthusiast?  Well, that could be useful if she kept it in check but highly annoying if she did not.  He would have to find out which one she was before it was too late to control it.  He did trust the good breeding of the Black family to have instilled much of the needed restraint in her, of course.

            In direct contrast, it was almost sickening to see the little blonde girl go positively batty with excitement whenever the star Gryffindor Chaser was playing to the crowd.  It was impossible to keep his eyes from finding her after every acrobatic display, after every goal scored.  It was impossible to pretend that anything had changed – that she wouldn’t cast the same appraising eye over him and waive him off as insignificant in the exact same way that she had three years ago.  

            Misunderstanding the reason for his stare (Lucius doubted that he was the only one whose eyes were drawn to the eccentric and ecstatic fan), Narcissa whispered to him that the blonde girl who would always catch his eye was, “Marissa Fletcher, a sad, silly little cheerleader who’s completely obsessed with James Potter.  It’s sickening.”

            If he had not been Lucius Malfoy, here his rage might have overcome him.  As it was, not even Narcissa noticed it.  _That_ was who she respected?  Yes, he was at least a pureblood, but the Potters were practically blood traitors!  _She_ worshipped a pathetic show-off Chaser whose family neglected its responsibilities and scorned its proper place in society?  Who sided with halfbloods, Mudbloods, and worse in the Ministry and in the War?  It was almost unbearable.

            Cold rage shown out of his eyes whenever his gaze involuntarily flicked to the girl practically dancing at the bottom of the Gryffindor stands for the rest of the match.  She did not notice.  She did not cast so much as a glance at the Alumni box, and Lucius Malfoy knew that, even if she had, her gaze would not have lingered on him.  Her eyes would have slid right over him without ever bothering to see him at all.  Yet she fixed her gaze on _James Potter_ for the duration of the match!

            When Lucius Malfoy was leading Narcissa down the stairs at the head of the crowd of Slytherins with great dignity and honor, he saw the very pretty fourteen-year-old girl running across the pitch and tackling Potter in her celebration, knocking the blustering braggart to the ground as she screamed in a most unnecessary manner.  He shuddered and looked away, unable to deal with the idea that the girl with contempt for _him_ gave admiration so freely to the likes of _Potters._   He was almost nauseated by her radiant smile as she danced around the Quidditch pitch with her precious Potter and their friends and their idiotic, foolhardy house.

            After escorting Narcissa to the front steps of the Castle and receiving a polite, proper peck on the cheek from his classically, aristocratically lovely betrothed, Lucius Malfoy headed back toward the gates to the school.  He had no desire to stay and eat in the Great Hall like many lowborn parents felt was so exciting.  Whenever he dined with Narcissa, he received permission to bring her to a fine restaurant or one of his family estates.  Dumbledore had not granted permission for her to leave the school tonight, however, even for a Governor’s son.

            As he was passing the Quidditch pitch again, he saw the pair that had embedded themselves in his mind three years ago standing outside the boys’ locker room, waiting for Potter to emerge.  He watched them for a moment, and it was indisputable that the two fourteen-year-old girls were as innocent and careless as four-year-olds.  They were laughing in a way that he had never seen anyone laugh – freely, fully, and without any restraint or darkness clouding their countenance.  Didn’t they know that there was a War going on?  Who were they to be immune to its ravages?

            They were also beautiful, each in her own way, and not just with the bloom and blush of youth.  The redhead was gorgeous and likely to grow more so.  A few more years and she would be a stunning, heart-stopping beauty.  The blonde girl looked positively ridiculous standing next to her.  In a way, she could have been one of Narcissa’s sisters, but then the looks of the Blacks oscillated in a very wide range.  She had light blue eyes and long blonde hair – but while Narcissa’s fell elegantly straight, the girl’s was wild, wavy and haphazardly entwined with red and gold ribbons.  Narcissa’s removed, distant expression was the polar opposite of the alive, sparkling look of the girl’s eyes.  Most of all, while Narcissa’s aristocratic, dainty features made her look like a queen, this _Marissa Fletcher_ looked about as refined as her idiotic costume of ten Gryffindor scarves with innumerable buttons and red corsages stuck to every conceivable  part of her clothing.  She was not ugly, but her eyes were large, her nose unremarkable, her forehead too small, her chin undefined, and her lips large.  She looked as folksy as any caricature of a Mudblood that he could have imagined.

            Seized with something he did not understand and could not control, Lucius Malfoy walked toward them purposefully.  When he was close enough to see that every one of what looked like hundreds of buttons displayed on her clothes was a picture of James Potter’s winking face, an almost _animal_ rage overcame him.  He drew his wand.

            “What _are_ those boys doing in there?  They know we’re waiting for them,” the redhead complained, shaking her head and oddly sounding amused more than annoyed by the stupid, inconsiderate boys’ tardiness.

            Lucius Malfoy could not bear to hear her silly little Mudblood voice.  He silenced her.  She started to speak again, grabbed her throat in surprise, and completely distracted both herself and the blonde in the process.  Lucius used that opportunity to immobilize the redhead.  Then the blonde turned around.  Too late.

            Not that it would have mattered, because her eyes seemed to once again slide over him like when _Muggles_ tried to see the Leaky Cauldron.  That was all she was, a _Muggle._   He grabbed her arm roughly and dragged her off behind the changing rooms, thinking that it would certainly look wrong if some idiot professor saw his freak attack.

            Once there he threw her down on the ground.  She looked up at him with her eyebrows raised not in fear or hate, but pure surprise.  It was something.  Then he got to work.  He grabbed the first scarf that his hands found and yanked unceremoniously, the force of the pull raising her to her feet.  He threw down his wand.  She thought that _he_ was beneath _her?_   Well, _she_ didn’t deserve the courtesy of him using _magic_ on the likes of _her._

He held her fast with a viselike grip on her arm, digging his nails into her skin right through her robe and blouse and drawing her insignificant, dirty blood as he tore the _stupid winking buttons_ off of her.  They seemed to be multiplying despite all of his efforts, however frantically he tore at them and her clothes.  Instead, he seemed to get more and more wrapped up in her scarves the more he tried to get them off of her.

            In the meantime, she was struggling to pull herself away, but he held her by her arm and did not let her escape.  Finally, growing frustrated with his inability to completely rid her of the horrendous buttons, he pulled her to him and grabbed the robe, forcing it off of her shoulders roughly.

            The girl used this opportunity.  She grabbed his shoulders and used his forward momentum to nudge him forward as she brought her knee up violently in the direction of a very sensitive area.  Lucius Malfoy had not seen ten thousand Muggle movies where women did a similar maneuver.  Few, in fact, had ever dared stand up to him in any way in his life.

            When Lucius found himself reduced to brawling with the likes of _Arthur Weasley_ in public, he would remember this first time that an enemy had dared physically attack him.  He would not realize that much of what made him regard Weasley as an adversary rather than just dismiss him would be the result of the deadly disease with which the gnat had infected him years ago.

            He fell to his knees, reeling in shock, as the girl started to dart away.  But there was far more pain involved in simply attending Death Eater meetings, not to mention the initiation.  Such a small pain could not daunt Lucius Malfoy for long.  He dove forward and caught her ankle, bringing her down to the ground with a flop.  Again, she kicked out and hit him squarely in the jaw.  Again, he could not be fazed by something so relatively painless as the well-aimed kick of fourteen-year-old girl.

            He yanked her back to him, sliding her along the ground until she was practically under him and he held her down with the weight of his body, ripping more of her clothes now not from a desire to rid the reminders of Potter from her but to leave her as naked and exposed as he felt under her gaze.  Such was his frenzy that he did not hear the footsteps over the scuffles of the fight.  He did not anticipate the redhead being able to muster a defense of her friend.

            But a great shout rose from her and slammed him back and away from the blonde.  The cry sounded like that of an Amazon, and the redhead certainly looked that part as she stood with her wand pointed at him as three of the four boys behind her (who must have released her from his Bind) rushed to pin him to the ground.  The fourth knelt down next to the blonde and helped her pull her robe back over herself.

            They stood frozen there like that for a long moment: the redhead training her wand on him and not daring to move her eyes away, looking far more formidable than any fourteen-year-old Mudblood had a right to look to a fully grown, prominent pureblood wizard. Three boys physically held him on the ground, and the blonde hurriedly buttoned what was left of the buttons on her blouse while the boy with light brown hair cautiously draped her robe over her shoulders.

            Then the blonde rose to her feet and the three boys yanked him up.  The redhead used the same spell that he had used to subdue her on him, transfixing him utterly in a way that few fully grown wizards ever had.  “You’ll pay for that,” she said in her most menacing voice.  In that moment, Lucius Malfoy almost believed that this girl could do it.  After all, she had immobilized him with a spell of his invention which she couldn’t possibly have known before he cast it on her.  She had immobilized him on her first attempt casting a spell that had taken him a full year to create and master.

            Then he recovered himself, roughly dismissing the fear that the little redhead had suddenly inspired.  However, it shattered his confidence again when the blonde spoke up even as she made final adjustments to what was left of her clothes.  She did not look at him and her voice was almost indifferent.  “Don’t bother, Lily.”  It was as if she knew, as if she had studied her whole life to find the words that would have most enraged Lucius Malfoy at that moment.

            “Riss!” Lily cried in shock and protest, turning around to look at her in disbelief.

            “I won’t give him the satisfaction of buying his way out of it,” she said, squaring her shoulders with surprising dignity.  “Besides,” she continued, walking forward until she was very close to him, “I feel sorry for him.”  She cast one look at him which was completely devoid of disgust or the pity that she had just expressed, then she walked right past him.  “And it’s not nice to pick on people weaker than you, Lils,” she called behind her.

            Lucius Malfoy was blind with rage but unable to break the Mudblood’s curse and lash out at Marissa Fletcher – unable to _force_ her to see him as terrifying and powerful and threatening and _something._   He was so beside himself with almost uncontrollable fury that he barely saw her pull her friend’s wand arm down to her side and lead her five still protesting friends back up toward the Castle where she would go on as outrageously happy and carefree and innocent and beautiful and contemptuous as she would have been if she had never had this encounter with him at all.

            A few minutes later, the redhead’s voice wafted toward him.  “Hagrid, is there anything that you’ve ever wanted to do or say to Lucius Malfoy but been too afraid to?  Well, he’s behind the changing rooms, and believe me, he won’t say a word about anything that happened tonight.”

            Lucius Malfoy waited for the blonde to stop her friend’s proxy retribution through that monster masquerading as a wizard.  She said nothing.  That was when Lucius Malfoy realized the fundamental truth about Marissa Fletcher: she did not care about him enough to do anything with, for or against him.

 

~~~

 

            Mrs. Lucius Malfoy and Mrs. Marissa Lupin were not friends.  They had never been friends, and they almost certainly would never be friends.  So of course, they had tea every Sunday afternoon.

            “I am sorry that we don’t have cakes, but bread and butter will have to do,” Mrs. Malfoy said politely.  That was certainly one thing that they were both capable of: utter politeness.

            “My stomach does not tolerate too much sugar these days anyway, bread and butter will do just fine, I thank you,” Mrs. Lupin replied politely.  It was a strange acquaintanceship that had turned more than a few heads.  However, looked at in the proper light, it was inevitable.  After all, in Hogwarts the then Narcissa Black had been among the first Slytherins to grudgingly accept the then Marissa Fletcher’s presence and status as Severus Snape’s girlfriend.  Her own worth had recommended her to most of Snape’s housemates and the best among the Slytherins had eventually accepted her even before Snape leaked the information about her mother’s high rank in wizarding society.

            They had never been close so their continued relationship had never interfered with either’s loyalties in the War.  They would certainly not have betrayed their cause for each other’s sake.  They had always talked to each other in a studied, careful and always deliberate manner.  They extended courtesy without familiarity and companionship without camaraderie.  Both sides wanted someone who was close to the other side, just to keep an eye on things.  Mrs. Malfoy and Mrs. Lupin, with their crisp, polite, unattached relationship, were perfect candidates for both the Order and the Death Eaters, although of course neither of them belonged to either group.

            “How are you faring?” Mrs. Malfoy asked out of sheer politeness.  Mrs. Lupin’s illness was not what she considered a proper teatime topic.  She did, however, want to stay well-informed.  She wished that she possessed Marissa Lupin’s talent for extracting information without ever asking direct questions about what she obviously wanted to know.  Actually, Narcissa Malfoy would settle for Marissa Lupin not having that talent.

            “Tolerably, Narcissa,” she said with a small smile and slight nod.  “Obviously not particularly well, but I am getting by fairly well.”

            “I am glad to hear it, Marissa,” Mrs. Malfoy replied and found that she meant it.  Narcissa Malfoy had not thought about Marissa Fletcher much until the arrogant girl had waltzed into the Slytherin Common Room on the arm of its least popular member as if she owned the place – as if she had every right in the world to be there.  She knew – _everyone_ knew – that she was a Potter groupie, of course.  As she watched the brazen hussy set up court in the Slytherin dungeon like she undoubtedly did in the Gryffindor Common Room where at least she had a right to be, Narcissa wondered what it was about Marissa Fletcher that made people give her their loyalty so freely.

            She inspired trust in people who should know better.  She made people like her, love her, swear that she was someone to be trusted.  Narcissa wondered, after years of being Marissa’s not-so-distant acquaintance, if the source of her strange power over people was the trust that she extended, without qualification, to others.  The thing that most surprised her about the extent of Marissa Lupin’s power over people was not that she won Narcissa over.  It was Lucius.

            Long before Narcissa became convinced – somehow – to appreciate Marissa Lupin’s company, Lucius had asked her to befriend the girl.  He was the one who insisted that Narcissa begin the weekly ritual of Sunday teatime.  He took more interest in the woman’s steadily deteriorating health than even the friends Marissa had once been closest to did these days.  He had donated a great deal of money to the projects that Marissa’s husband tried to launch to find a cure for her Muggle disease.

            Lucius never interfered with her social calls, except with Marissa Lupin.  He came when she visited.  He was sitting in the next room, behind the door, listening to their conversation this afternoon.  What Narcissa could barely understand about their relationship was that all of their interactions were colder than Marissa Lupin acted with anyone else.  She was as warm and funny and familiar as the other person could tolerate with each and every person that she met, except Lucius.

            Not that Narcissa’s own interactions with her were relaxing these days.  Sometimes, at school, she would find herself almost letting down her guard around the silly little Gryffindor.  Now, however, the parlor was thick with all the things that they could not say.  All of the games that they were playing wove circles around them.  All of the secrets for which they probed and prodded each other hung in a mass between them.  It had been building for some time, this thick, active and heavy parlor, but today was different.  Narcissa knew the reason, and though she didn’t doubt that Marissa Lupin sensed it, Narcissa was almost entirely sure that she didn’t know why.  She said “almost entirely” because Marissa Lupin had surprised her many times with what she could decipher from seemingly non-existent clues.  But even Marissa Lupin would almost certainly be unaware that Lucius was listening in the next room.

            Narcissa did not like being a variable in her husband’s experiments, but she agreed because he had always acted in the best interests of their son and his inheritance both financially and as an honored member of the Dark Lord’s Inner Circle.  So the three of them sat in relative silence with all of the things that they had left unspoken too long whirling around them in erratic spirals.

            And as if the parlor were not crowded enough, Severus Snape entered it a moment later.  “Severus,” Mrs. Lupin cried in mild surprise.  “I didn’t know that you would be joining us.”

            “It is nice to see you in such fine health, Mrs. Lupin,” he nodded to her politely, crossing the room and, at a gesture from Mrs. Malfoy, taking a seat across from Mrs. Lupin.  “How do you do, Mrs. Malfoy,” he bowed in greeting.  Unlike the two women, however, he spoke the language of diplomacy with a thick, gruff accent.  They were natives, or at least flawlessly fluent, and he would always be an uncomfortable foreigner in that tongue.

            “Very well, though I must say that it certainly seems strange to hear you call Marissa by her husband’s name,” Mrs. Malfoy remarked, using one of her more genuinely pleasant voices.  “I never thought that I would see the two of you so formal.”

            “Do you call Lestrange ‘Rodolphus’ in public then?” Snape retaliated with a mild drawl.

            Narcissa’s eyes hardened into a look of cold fury for a moment as she regarded him.  “My sister’s husband and I were never involved,” she told him in a truly glacial tone of voice.

            “And yet you do not refer to him informally any longer,” Snape returned, “and that from only the false rumor of a relationship.  Imagine when Mrs. Lupin and I were, in fact, once involved.”

            “Is that what we were?” Mrs. Lupin asked, a very out-of-place smirk gracing her face briefly, which she hid behind a teacup.

            “What did he call you before you married Lupin?  ‘Miss Fletcher?’” Narcissa asked, now sounding incredibly curious about the minute details of their relationship.  “Apparently not simply ‘Marissa’ then.”

            It was Mrs. Lupin who answered.  “Severus never called me ‘Marissa’ in his life.  Never ‘Miss Fletcher’ either for that matter.”  She smiled at him as if sharing a private joke, but only she seemed to be part of it.  Snape did not join in her amusement.  “He hasn’t called me by my given name since we started dating.”

            “You were just ‘Fletcher’ to me before that,” Snape said, sounding as if he thought that this topic of conversation would be over more quickly if he cooperated rather than obstructed it.

            “If I did that well,” Marissa said, the once ever-present laugh in her voice prominent now.  “But he hasn’t called me that since the first time that he kissed me.”

            “And while you were dating you had that ridiculous little pseudonym,” Narcissa picked up the narration.  “For awhile, I thought that it was some misguided attempt to separate her from the Gryffindor prefect we all knew when you had her among Slytherins.  I thought that you were under the impression that by calling her a new name you could convince us that your girlfriend was a different person entirely from the acting President of the James Potter Fan Club.”  Narcissa took a moment to sip her tea and observe the sudden spike in the awkwardness of the situation at the mention of James Potter.  “But then I overheard you calling her ‘my Fran’ when you thought that no one was around.  I’ve always wondered about that since then.”

            Mrs. Lupin’s old, wide and unrestrained smile came to her lips.  However, she cast a quick look at Snape before she explained, “Since you finally asked outright, which no one in all of these years has done, I will risk telling you that it was after Francesca de Rimini.”

            “The _Inferno_ seems a little dark for you, Marissa,” Mrs. Malfoy remarked in mild surprise, “but also very fitting for your relationship.”

            “You know Dante’s _Divine Comedy_?” Mrs. Lupin asked, raising one eyebrow daintily.  “That seems a little Muggle for you, Narcissa.”

            “Please,” Narcissa replied quietly.  “Did you never, then, make the connection between the Guelfs and the Ghibellines?  Did you think pure Muggle politics tore apart the city of Florence?  Think which side would want Papal power, say the side that envies the special power of others?  And an unusually low level of both recruiting and crossover between parties usually indicates wizard and Muggle interaction, especially from that era.”

            Marissa Lupin was smiling in amusement, “The Ghibellines were wizards.”  She shook her head.  “The conflict has certainly gone on too long then.  Almost seven centuries…”

            “Wake up, darling,” Mrs. Malfoy replied, “it has been going on much longer than that.”  Here the awkwardness settled heavily on all of the parties again.  Mrs. Lupin seemed to be mentally berating herself for highlighting her anti-purity beliefs.  Snape was silent, but then that was not really a change.

            All three of them knew that Mrs. Malfoy would have to be the one to break the silence.  Being an impeccable hostess, she soon fulfilled her duty, “I do have one more uncomfortable question to ask before we move on.”  They both glanced up at her politely.  She continued with great innocence, “Why not Beatrice?”

            “It is a relief to hear someone pronounce it correctly instead of calling her ‘Bee-uh-tris,’” Mrs. Lupin said by way of answer.  “The Italian ‘Bee-ah-tree-chay’ is so beautiful, but Severus and I felt that it would be inappropriate.  I was not on a heavenly mission to save him from himself.”

            “No, rather she was casting herself into hell for the sake of passion,” Snape deadpanned.

            Mrs. Lupin met his eyes for a moment before he looked away.  Her eyes seemed to express her sadness and disapproval of his characterization of their relationship.  “That is not precisely what we meant to express with our chosen pet name,” she said in a tone of slight rebuke.

            “Passion?” Mrs. Malfoy asked with one eyebrow raised.

            “How are the Lestranges?” Mrs. Lupin asked in a mild tone of voice.

            “Very well,” Mrs. Malfoy said, punctuating her displeasure at this attack by setting her teacup down on the saucer a little too hard.  “And your husband?”

            “Getting along just fine,” Mrs. Lupin replied politely, deliberately setting down her teacup with the utmost delicacy.

            “He gets back tomorrow, does he not?” Mrs. Malfoy inquired.

            “At the latest, yes,” Mrs. Lupin replied.  “I tried to convince him to Floo back tonight, but he was afraid of waking me.  I swear, even with the time difference, he must think that I go to sleep at nine o’clock.  I don’t see how his interview could possibly go much longer than that.”

            “He has had distinct trouble finding a job here, I understand,” Mrs. Malfoy clucked sympathetically.  “Pity, he was certainly very bright at school.”

            “He still is,” Mrs. Lupin added.  “Most who would have employed him were concerned that he is preoccupied with my care.  They are afraid he will have to leave work soon to take over nursing me full time should my condition deteriorate further.”

            “Does that occurrence seem imminent?” Snape asked, hiding any concern that he might have felt well.

            “The doctors are not entirely optimistic,” Mrs. Lupin said seriously, meeting his eyes and successfully holding them for the first time during the awkward meeting.

            “I do wish that you would see our Healers,” Mrs. Malfoy told her.

            Mrs. Lupin smiled slightly.  “I doubt that they would tell me any differently than the other Healers that I have seen.  It is not a magical disease and well out of their range of expertise.  Even witches and wizards must go to the Muggle medical world for cancer treatment I fear.”

            “Unfortunately it is not a common disease in the magical world,” Snape said.

            “Among purebloods, of course,” Mrs. Malfoy added.

            “Of course,” Mrs. Lupin responded mildly.  “When does Lucius return, Narcissa?  He and Bella have both been gone for quite some time.  Or have they simply been hiding from their social duties?”

            “Lucius will be back sometime next week,” Narcissa replied.  “Bella is already back.  Whether or not she is hiding is not mine to say.  She certainly has no reason to, that I know of, of course.”

            “Of course,” Mrs. Lupin replied with a slight nod.

 

~~~

 

            Narcissa Black Malfoy found it distinctly degrading to be listening at the window to the conversation between Severus Snape and Marissa Lupin.  However, Lucius wanted her opinion.  Intellectually, she saw the reason for his doubt.  She also knew why Lucius needed more than his own opinion to make this decision.  Marissa Lupin had, had always had, an almost hypnotic effect on those whose confidence she wished to inspire.  Even now, having seen in the past half hour the veiled probing questions and the silent communication with Snape, Narcissa wanted to disbelieve with everything in her that Marissa Lupin could be Dumbledore’s spy.

            A less skilled woman, perhaps any woman other than Marissa Lupin, would have been discovered long ago if she had had the audacity to walk brazenly into Malfoy Manor once a week to gather intelligence for the Order.  But Marissa Lupin inspired trust, however grudgingly given.  And if her effect on Narcissa was hypnotic, on Lucius it was spellbinding.  Her husband was positively obsessed with Marissa Lupin and had been as long as Narcissa could remember her being in their lives.  He was the one who had requested that she befriend her, that she influence the other Slytherins to accept her presence in the Slytherin common room.  Now, however, he was the first to break the spell and realize the obvious: that Marissa Lupin was working for Dumbledore.

            Snape’s interaction with her only confirmed it.  He held her arm as he escorted her to the car waiting for her, but he stopped her just before they reached the door.  “Do you know what you’re doing, Mrs. Lupin?” he asked her mildly.

            “I have some idea, Severus,” she replied mildly.

            Narcissa could almost see his grip on her arm tighten.  “Do you?  Do you know whom you are trying to play?  Whom you think you can deceive?”

            “I am walking to my car, how is that deceptive?” Mrs. Lupin asked with something like a laugh in her voice.  “Unless you are about to suggest that Remus would not appreciate me allowing you to escort me, I am afraid that I cannot fathom what you mean.”

            “Just,” the word seemed to burst unwillingly from Snape, “promise me that you will be careful.”

            Marissa Lupin smiled slightly.  “I am not going to die from stepping into a car, I promise,” she replied, opening the door.  He helped her inside and watched her drive away with a worried look on his face before he Apparated away.

            Only then did Lucius turn to her.  “Well that was obvious enough,” was all that he said.  So much for wanting her input.

            “Obvious that Snape is not part of it,” Narcissa replied, mostly to be contrary but also partially because he had convinced her.

            “At the very least he’s warning her, trying to warn a spy of Dumbledore not to be caught,” Lucius replied.

            “Loyalty to an old flame might extend that far, but he wouldn’t betray the Dark Lord for her, not really,” Narcissa told her husband.

            “So would you extend that much courtesy to Rodolphus?” Lucius asked.

            If the look that Narcissa had given Snape had been icy, the one that she gave her husband would make the polar icecaps shiver.  “It is one thing for ignorant halfbloods to babble on about things that they do not understand.  It is quite another for you to do so,” she told him, moving away from the window.

            “Very well, my _darling_ ,” Lucius replied, turning to face her.  “I will trust your judgment for the present, but I do hope that you will not be insulted if I ask the man with the old flame to be a member of the party?”

            “Will you want me along to help you judge his reaction there as well?” Narcissa asked with something approaching annoyance in her voice.

            “You shrink from doing your duty to the Dark Lord, my love?” Lucius asked, approaching her from behind and gently gathering her pale blonde hair into his hands.

            She turned around, facing her husband with his hand still holding her by her hair.  “I have turned on a friend for you today.  I wonder that you expect asking me to study Severus Snape’s reaction to her capture to make me cringe?”

            “He did save the Goring girl,” Lucius reminded her.  “I never did figure that one out.”  

            Narcissa reached up and smoothed her husband’s brow.  “I think that you have been plotting too long, love,” she told him in a hushed whisper.

            Her husband did not seem to hear her.  “The Lupins were the ones who took her in, weren’t they?  Distant relatives?  What if she asked Snape to save the girl?”

            Narcissa wanted to snap at her husband that not everything was tied up in Marissa Lupin.  Sometimes, however, Narcissa wondered if, for her husband, everything did begin and end with the young blonde woman.  He had been obsessed with her as far back as Narcissa could remember her being a topic of conversation between them.  

            She wanted to snap back at him that the Lupins most certainly had _not_ adopted the girl, though they had tried, and they had only discovered the blood connection after her rescue.  She further wanted to scream at him that not everyone centered their lives around Marissa Lupin.  Severus Snape could have had ten thousand motives for his rescue mission, each of which had nothing to do with Marissa bloody Lupin.

            Instead of even sighing to vent her frustration, however, she simply said, “I will watch Snape tonight so that you can focus on Mrs. Lupin.”

            Then she moved away from her husband and his plotting and went to see her baby.

 

~~~

 

            “I’m home, Riss,” came from the foyer, following quickly by the sound of the door shutting.

            “Remus!” Marissa caroled happily down to him.  “I’m upstairs!”  She popped up and ripped her hospital-issue smock off as she dove into her wardrobe to extract different clothing.  There was little point, really, in trying to disguise her rapidly declining health from her husband, but it would make their night much better if they didn’t have to be reminded by her clothing.

            “Can you be more specific?” his voice called, sounding all together too close for her hasty operation.

            “In the bedroom!” she called, throwing on the first nightgown that her frantic hands found and kicking the hospital-wear under the bureau as quickly as possible.  She was just straightening the long, white silk nightgown when she saw him walk into the room and lean against the doorframe looking a little tired and very pleased to see her.

            “Hello, darling,” she said with a genuine, warm smile.  “But you do know that we’re going to have a fight, right?”

            “Why?” he demanded with false innocence.

            “I told you to always tell me the real time that you expected to be home,” she said, doing her best to look stern and, as usual with Remus, failing abysmally.  She was a fabulous actress, except when her husband was her audience.  Then she failed utterly.  “How many times have I asked you not to give me false estimates?”

            “Come here and I’ll make it up to you,” he said, reaching out a hand for her.

            Twisting her mouth into a sly smile, she walked forward towards him.  The moment that she placed her hand lightly in his, he yanked her to him with surprising force and crushed her to him with his other arm.  That was the first moment that she began to feel cold.

            She shook it off and merely raised an eyebrow at him as she said, “Miss me, Remus?”

            “Dreadfully,” he replied, bending down and covering her mouth with his.

            The moment that he did, she knew.  She did not need to feel his hands running over her or feel him start to drag her to the bed to know that it was not her husband who had walked so brazenly into her home.  She was enraged at the gall of the imposter for only a moment.  Soon she was just amazed at his stupidity for thinking that she wouldn’t know her husband’s kisses, much less his caresses, from another’s.

            When he broke the kiss, she simply replied with as much of a smile as she could muster, “I see you have missed me.”  He gave a hollow laugh and started kissing her neck.  Marissa tried not to recoil or even shudder in her disgust.  “Well,” she almost laughed, proving her considerable talents as an actress, “if that’s where your mind is, you should really go get – you know – out of the bathroom.”

            The man who was most definitely not her husband looked up at her in slight confusion.  She sighed and feigned annoyance.  “Really, Remus!  We’ve discussed this!  The doctors say we shouldn’t take any chances.  Stop fooling around.”

            The man obediently moved toward the door to the bathroom as she lay there with her arms folded.  “That’s better.  Don’t come back until you have one.”

            “Yes, dear,” the man replied with a grin surprisingly like her husband’s.  Marissa tried not to vomit.  The moment that he was out of sight in the bathroom, she sprang up from the bed and rushed to her vanity.  She pulled out one of her cosmetics cases and grabbed a handful of the floury white powder.

            She had never been more glad to have a fire going in the fireplace in her bedroom.  She threw the floo powder on it and stepped into the flames.  Unfortunately, she had grabbed too much powder and most of it seemed to have taken up residence in her throat.  As she tried to cry out her destination, she started to cough violently.  “G-godr-“

            “Malfoy Manor!” the man’s voice yelled from the doorway, a fire of rage such as she had never seen in her real husband’s eyes smoldering as the imposter saw her attempted flight.

            “No!” Marissa cried as she was whirling through the warm green flames.

            She landed sprawled out on the cold marble of a fireplace in the Malfoy Manor where she had had tea with Narcissa Malfoy and Severus Snape only that afternoon as an invited guest.  A thin, pale hand grabbed her own and helped her to her feet.  Winded from the trip and her splat onto the hard marble, it took a moment for the world to stop spinning.  “Don’t try to run, Marissa,” Narcissa told her, dropping her hand.

            “Will you keep your promise about Gus?” Marissa demanded, catching and forcing Narcissa Malfoy to hold her gaze.  “You said that you would make sure that he was all right if anything ever happened to me and Remus.  Will you keep your promise?”

            “You never actually accepted my promise,” Narcissa told her coldly.  “You merely said that it was a lovely offer.  You didn’t want it at the time, so I’m afraid the promise is non-binding.”  Then Narcissa Malfoy stepped away from Marissa Lupin and joined the circle of hooded figures who were closing around her.

            She took an involuntary step back towards the fire, her only exit not blocked by a menacing attacker.  Or so she thought.  She backed straight into the man who had just arrived through the fireplace.  He grabbed her shoulders with his hands and whirled her around to face the man who was not her husband.

            Before her very eyes, Remus’s features melted into those of Lucius Malfoy, who regarded her with cold, hard eyes.

            This was the moment for which Lucius Malfoy had waited for years.  Ever since she had casually waved him off in the corridors of Hogwarts, he had been thirsting for this moment when into her eyes would explode everything that he had ever wanted to see there.  Now, when he had her in his power, she could surely no longer dismiss him.

            “I know that you need your medication,” he told her.  “Tell me where the Potters are and I promise that you’ll have it.”

            Marissa Lupin did not say anything.  She simply regarded him for a moment, then spit in his face.  

            The cold liquid hit his nose and clung.  “I’ve wanted to do that for seven years,” she said.

            “Why didn’t you?” he demanded, crushing her arms in his grip and pulling her farther forward.  If she had reviled and hated him for seven years, then his demons could have been quelled long ago.

            “Because there are more important things than _you_ in my life,” she spat with contempt, and this hit Lucius Malfoy harder than the spit had a moment ago.  He flung her to the ground and stood over her.

 

_In your eyes, I wanted to see fear.  I wanted you to look me in the eyes and quail as you thought, ‘what great power, what terrible danger is in this man.’  That would be victory for me.  But it wasn’t there, and that round – even that round – went to you._

 

            “Tell us where the Potters are!” another Death Eater demanded, advancing on the fallen young woman.

            “Don’t bother,” Lucius waved the man away.  “I doubt she even knows who they chose for their Secret Keeper.”  He stood over her, leaning down so that he could see the hurt on her face as he spoke his next words.  “Ironically, they were the first ones to stop trusting you.  So you have no one now, little gnat.”

            “If this is going to go on for a while, I’m going to need a glass of water,” Marissa said, her voice laced with disdain.  “Do you think that you can oblige?”

            “Why don’t you quake in fear?” Lucius roared down at her.  “Your little friends aren’t here to save you now!  You are mine!”

            Marissa Lupin gave a little laugh.  “Who are you?”

            He grabbed her and yanked her to her feet, “I am Lucius Malfoy!  Heir to one of the Seven Old Families, Governor of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry!  On the board of every major wizarding institution!  Honored servant of the Dark Lord!”

            “Well, there’s the difference between us,” Marissa Lupin interrupted his speech in a mild voice.  “You see, I’m my own woman.  I am no slave to a madman.  I am free.”

            “Not anymore,” he hissed at her, flinging her into the arms of Severus Snape who caught her as roughly as he seemed to dare.  “Anton, take her below!”

            Lucius Malfoy nearly exploded with rage when he saw the look of pain and sorrow which Marissa Lupin turned on Severus Snape.  Even as she was ripped out of his grip by Anton Dolohov, her eyes followed Severus Snape, full of some deep emotion made of equal parts pain and disappointment.  

            She looked at a stupid halfblood the way that she had never looked at Lucius Malfoy.  At that moment, Lucius could have committed murder, and not the cold, calculated kind that he could commit every day of the week and twice on Sundays.  Lucius Malfoy had never been guilty of a crime of passion, but he was dangerously close to one now as he saw Marissa Lupin looking tortured by Severus Snape’s betrayal.  Snape, for his part, was regarding her coldly and indifferently.  Idiot.  Didn’t he know what such a look meant?  What Lucius Malfoy would have given to have it directed at him?

            “Get her out of my sight!” he roared again, watching as Anton dragged her out of the room and down to the dungeons under his family home.  When she was gone he stood there huffing like a winded rhinoceros, red in the face with his long bleached blonde hair wild around him.  He had never looked more like an injured lion.  That was what that stupid little Gryffindor was supposed to look like when this was over.  Instead, as always, he was the one rendered powerless and frustrated.

 

~~~

 

            Narcissa stayed in the room with him long after the rest of the Death Eaters had left.  Such a large number were not necessary and would not have been provided unless Lily, James and Harry Potter had suddenly, only half an hour before Marissa Lupin’s capture, disappeared from the notice of their assigned tail.

            “I have only one question for you,” Narcissa told him as she coldly observed the somewhat sunken version of her powerful and supremely confident husband.  “Your obsession with Marissa Lupin, is it over now?”

            Lucius Malfoy said nothing.  He did not even look at his wife.  “I see,” she said in a deathly quiet whisper.  “Then I have only one more thing to say to you tonight.  If you attempt to complete the action which you began when she was fourteen, and I suspect again tonight in her husband’s image, remember that Draco and I are visiting my mother’s in a week.  You have already given your permission for a visit of indefinite duration.  You would have no magical or legal recourse.”

            With that, his wife walked out of the room.  Lucius knew that her threat was not empty.  A male heir produced, many marriages took the path that she had outlined.  If she thought that he had so much as touched Marissa Lupin, she would not return from her visit to her mother’s.  Draco would be raised by the Blacks, and, though Narcissa would never officially end their marriage, she would never return to Malfoy Manor.  

            She needed not have bothered with the threat.

            Lucius Malfoy knew now that he could never have forced respect from Marissa Lupin.  All of his efforts over the years had resulted only in seeing her change from a silly little first year who had ignorantly dismissed him to a wily, wise woman of the world who had nothing but contempt for him, even when he had her in his power.  He could not win, because even when he had mastered her in every way, Lucius knew that Marissa Lupin’s opinion of him would never change.

            If what she saw as an attempted rape had not imprinted him in her mind at the tender age of fourteen, he would not beat her by raping a full-grown married woman.  He had never really had any interest in sleeping with her.  He had wanted to strip her bare at fourteen to expose her to the same shame he felt in her presence.  He had been intoxicated with the look of importance shining out of her eyes in the moments before she realized that he was not her precious Remus Lupin.  But it was never her body or even her love that he had wanted.  He had wanted her fear and her hate.  He knew now that she would never grant him that.

            He resolved in that moment to move on, to never think of her again, to let her rot in the dungeon and die and fade away without even a blip on the radar of the wizarding world to mark her passing.  But in that moment, when he sat on the cold marble fireplace in something approaching despair, he knew that he would never forget the look of cold dismissal she had given him.  He would never be able to forget how she refused even then to see him as even a worthy opponent, much less a victor.  He knew what Marissa Lupin would always think of him, and he would never be able to recover from it completely.

            Lucius took a swig from a bottle of whiskey and drank to the death of Marissa Lupin, the only adversary that he had faced that had reduced him to this.

            He had thought that continual sparring with her, testing her, doing battle to force her to prove she was a spy would compel her to fear and respect him.  He had thought that provoking, at long last, a reaction from her would free him from her indifference. But nothing could break the spell that she had cast on him.  All that she did, every encounter that they had had, only made him realize the truth.

 

_In your eyes, I am nothing._

            And the truly terrifying thought followed that one.  Maybe he was nothing.


	3. James: The Reason I Trusted You

**Chapter Two**

**The Reason I Trusted You**

 

_In your eyes, I am a brother._

            David and Cindy Potter had only one son, but James Potter had never lacked for brothers and sisters.  The extended Potter family was reasonably large, but James had never been limited to that.

            It was amazing, really, the way that James Potter inspired the loyalty of those around him.  Either hatred or devotion resulted from every first encounter with the boy.  Whichever the result, there was very little variation in the degree.  Feelings toward James Potter were always extreme.

            The way that he made his friends and enemies was often bizarre.  He made the best friend of his life by dumping him in the lake on their first night at Hogwarts.  He made his greatest enemy by spilling him out of the same boat.  The fourth person in the boat that night eventually became his wife.

            It was clear from the moment that the foursome entered the Great Hall, soaking wet and half an hour late, that a partnership had been formed between the first two boys.  They strutted in ahead of a blushing redhead and a glowering dark boy with considerable pride in the first class mayhem that they had caused.

            James Potter and Sirius Black earned their popularity in much the same way over the next few years.  Their fellow students (and often professors) couldn’t help but laugh at the – mostly – good-natured pranks they pulled.  Even Professor McGonagall seemed to enjoy some of the wild stunts that disrupted the school.  They were also scarcely fazed by their trips to Headmaster Dumbledore’s office.  Even when James or Sirius attacked an innocent bystander – usually because the somewhat paranoid duo thought it was a recent prank victim about to retaliate – the students of Hogwarts did not turn on them.  They were like big brothers – even when they pummeled you for no reason you adored them.

            They did make some of their friends in a more normal way.  When they found out that their little stunt on the first night had almost gotten Hagrid fired, they spent most of their afternoons down in his hut for a month.  He, like nearly everyone else, seemed to hold no grudge against them.  After it became clear that Dumbledore would not fire him, he found the whole incident funny.  They would not have been them, however, if they did not also see the distinct advantage of being friends with the Groundskeeper.  With his help, they knew their way through the Forbidden Forest better than any pair of first years before them or since.

            One friend they made by virtue of being a dorm mate, but he proved himself an extremely useful person to have in a pinch rather than an annoying tagalong.  Several times when they were about to be caught, Peter had a back-up plan.  James and Sirius said it time and again at Hogwarts and Lily would remark on it in her reports to the Order years later: Peter Pettigrew could talk his way out of anything.  It came from growing up with two lawyers for parents.  Within the first two months, he had memorized all of the School Rules and Codes of Conduct for both students and professors.  He combined unequaled knowledge of the rules with a natural talent for bending and manipulating them.  He was, therefore, fabulous at talking his way out of trouble.  Like most barristers who twist the law for their own purposes, this did not make him terribly popular with the powers that be or the other students at the Castle.  However, to Hogwarts’ two most reckless pranksters, he was an invaluable companion.  And Peter?  Peter worshipped James and Sirius.

            There was one friend that they knew from the very first night that they would eventually, inevitably make.  Just as soon as they had beaten her.

            After regaling those around them with a harrowing tale of adventure on the high seas (lake), they bestowed upon themselves the immemorial title that they felt they had earned: The First Years Who Caused the Most Trouble On Their First Night in the Castle.  Because, honestly!  Arriving half an hour late for the _Sorting_ had to put them automatically in the Hall of Fame for all time!  They were terribly dismayed when the highly amused fifth year prefect who had listened attentively to their tale disagreed.

            “Any other year, you’d have it, no contest,” Nate Powers told them.  “I’d even swear that it was a record sure never to be beaten.  Unfortunately for you – and me – you’ve been outdone by one of your new fellow Gryffindors.”

            In response to their furious demands for an explanation, Alexis Knowles pointed down the table to where the other four new first years sat.  “That blonde one, Marissa Fletcher, snuck her little brother onto the Hogwarts Express,” she explained.  Just then, the crowd at the table parted enough for the two boys to see a small, mousey-haired boy of six or seven sitting in between the blonde girl who had apparently beaten them and the redhead they had dumped in the lake.  All four of the new first years sitting around him burst into laughter at the same moment, the little boy looking extremely proud of himself for this accomplishment.  “It’s going to be quite a year,” Alexis Knowles said with a small sigh, shaking her head and sharing a glance with her prefect partner.

            And, indeed, it was.  In fact, for James and Sirius it was war.  After Marissa Fletcher stole the thunder from James and Sirius’s glorious grand entrance, it couldn’t be anything else.  The first few months resulted in an ever escalating prank war between the two trios of Gryffindors.  For the last time until they left the Castle seven years later, the rest of the students and staff were spared most of the mayhem of the six Gryffindors.  Altogether, they had been much more manageable when they were turning on each other than when they eventually teamed up to cause mayhem for the school at large.  Marissa, Lily and Remus proved a match, or nearly, for James, Sirius and Peter when directly provoked.  It was a hilarious comedy of errors as fledglings flexed their magical wings by attacking each other in highly creative ways.

            Somewhere in the middle of a gigantic food fight in a small room where they had been lured, the team lines broke down.  In the free for all that resulted, the Prank War ended.  By the time that they all collapsed onto the floor, covered in chocolate and whipped cream, they were all laughing too hard to care about their contest.

            The strangest part about this encounter was that neither side remembered engineering the original prank.  They immediately suspected foul play, but nailing down the culprit was harder than they expected.  Who in Hogwarts Castle would dare – much less want – to lock up the feuding Gryffindor pranksters in a room with tons of chocolate cake, whipped cream, and chocolate sauce?  James and Sirius, of course, declared that it must have been Professor McGonagall fed up with their infighting embarrassing Gryffindor.  Marissa and Lily thought that, if it had been a professor, as the endlessly renewing magical sweets seemed to suggest, the enigmatic Headmaster Dumbledore was more likely than the stern Transfiguration professor.

            It wasn’t until twenty-six years later, when a very different Potter was causing trouble for the so-called “Headmistress,” that Remus and Sirius learned the truth about the “Chocolate Room” across from the tapestry of Barnabas the Barmy.  They then realized that Hogwarts itself had known that what they needed to get along was a lot of sweets to shove in each other’s faces and hair.  The two Marauders left would wonder if Hogwarts had known how much they would, desperately, need each other in the years to come.  Or how much the world would need them.

            The most common comment made about their year after that incident was that the Gryffindor Six would probably die for each other – and if they didn’t tone down their pranks soon, they might.

            Even after second year, when the boys discovered Remus’s secret and began to form a tighter group among themselves, the Gryffindor Six were still the closest group at Hogwarts.  Until their fifth year, when the first of the breaks started occurring, they enjoyed the sweetest, simplest, and strongest friendship of their lives.

 

~*~*~

 

            So it was the hardest thing that could have been asked of James Potter to admit to himself that someone in the Gryffindor Six was working for Voldemort.  It was the hardest thing that he would ever have to do: look for a traitor among those he loved and trusted more than anyone else in the world, save only Harry.

            For what felt like the thousandth time in the past year, James Potter started his mental list:

            He knew that he was not a traitor.

            Don’t even make him laugh mentioning Lily.  The girl who faced down Lucius Malfoy at the age of four-bloody-teen – the moment that James had long suspected had been the moment that he fell for her – join Voldemort?  The only genuine article Muggleborn in their midst?  Perhaps the fiercest and most determined warrioress for the Order of the Pheonix?  Not to mention she was his wife and Harry’s mother.

            And Sirius?  Please!  The boy who ran away from this dark family at the age of sixteen – before he understood all the costs of such a choice – and had turned his back on all of that ever since then?  The operative who put his life on the line so freely that he had been  accused of being suicidal rather than sacrifice the smallest Order goal?  Him a double agent?  Harry’s godfather who had been the one to warn them of approaching attackers when he and Lily had been too distracted by the arrival of their bundle of joy?

            That left only three of the Gryffindor Six.  So who would it be?  Peter Pettigrew who had saved Lily’s life countless times or the couple that had opted out of the War?  That wasn’t entirely fair as Marissa’s health certainly wouldn’t have permitted her to fight, but it was hard not to consider it.

            “I don’t know, Lils,” James told his wife, staring morosely into the fire.  He felt her sit down a moment later, and, from the gurgling noises, she had Harry with her.  “How could it be any of them?”

            “Don’t you mean either of them?” Lily asked quietly.  James’s head dropped down and he grabbed his frazzled hair in frustration and pain.  He _needed_ this to go away.  “I don’t want to think it’s them any more than you do,” his wife whispered to him.

            “Merlin, can’t we at least say their names?” James cried, ripping his head up.  He met his wife’s pain-racked green eyes for a long moment.  “I can’t do it either.  Not when we’re talking about this.”

            “Riss was the one who kept us from splintering after the love triangle gone wrong,” Lily said.  “And Remus owes all of you boys more than anyone could ever repay, more than anyone could ever forget.”

            “Lily, how could she?  How could he?  How can we even consider…”  James stopped and said in a different voice,  “Do you remember your seventeenth birthday?”

            “How could I forget?” Lily asked, almost laughing as she swatted him on the arm with her free hand.  She gave him a stern look for the sake of appearances, “You were drunker than I’ve ever seen you before or since.  You humiliated me in front of my entire family and threw up most of the night.”

            James only grinned more broadly.  “Remember how you sent Riss in to wake me up the next morning?”

            “It served you right!” Lily said staunchly.  Then she laughed.  “My uncles looked at her like she was from outer space when she gave me the list of objects she wanted me to conjure for her.  Then my aunt asked me if I really wanted to send a pretty girl up to my boyfriend’s bedroom.  I figured I’d cut my losses and explain that she was your cousin without trying to explain her props list.”

            “In that case, thanks a lot for the cymbals,” James replied sarcastically.  “I think my ears are still ringing from that.”  Lily only laughed.  Harry followed suit, absolutely delighting his parents.  Then James turned solemn for a moment, “That’s the only time before now that I’ve ever thought of Marissa as evil.”

 

~*~*~

 

            In fairness, anyone would have thought Marissa evil, sadistic and spiteful that morning.  By the Staff of Merlin, she had burst into James’s room, hopped on his bed and banged the cymbals together with a great crash right over his head.  “Good morning!” she had shouted altogether too brightly for any early Sunday morning, much less one when he had been trashed the night before.

            James Potter gave the grunt and groan of his life in rapid succession, but even so it was wildly insufficient to express his displeasure with this occurrence.  “No pity!” Marissa caroled, bouncing off the bed.  James repeated the performance with even more emotion and reached weakly for what he knew would be the meager protection of his pillow.  His groping hand, which he could barely stand to lift, could not find one.  After a long moment’s reflection, James determined that there wasn’t one under his head either.

            Marissa, in the meantime, had not been idle.  The sheets under him heaved and his never more fragile stomach nearly did too.  After a number of unintelligible sounds and a few unprintable words, James groaned, “Lily sent you to torture me?”

            Marissa let out the most unappreciated laugh of her life.  “And I thought she was exaggerating,” she said, sounding highly amused.  “Just how drunk were you last night?  You barely even moved when I banged the cymbals in your ears.”

            “Thank for that, by th’way,” he slurred out at his most sarcastic.  It was safe to say that he truly hated Marissa Fletcher at this moment.

            “You’re welcome,” she practically sang altogether too loudly, altogether too happily and altogether too close.  The next moment he was instantly wet and cold.  Had he not noticed the sounds of water running or her footsteps?  Or had he just ignored them in favor of savoring the last few minutes he had on the nice, soft though pillow-less bed before she deprived him of that too?  Oh well, inattentive or understandably lazy, he was wet through now.

            James Potter had no memory of the phrases that poured out of his mouth after the water hit him.  He had a feeling that he had blocked them out in self-defense, not wanting to remember saying those things to a friend.  His memory picked up when he finally bellowed, “Even if you don’t care about me, don’t you at least care that you’ll wake the whole house?  And ruin the mattress!”

            “Everyone in the Evans family is at church,” Marissa replied.  “That means we have a little over an hour in which to get you presentable.  And don’t worry, Lily charmed the water in these buckets before she left.  Your concern for the mattress is touching, however.”

            “It’s the only thing that’s keeping me from killing myself,” James replied, both because it was true at that moment and because he hoped beyond hope that it would influence her to leave him there for at least a little while longer.

            “So the still-loving girlfriend and the four friends who would give their right elbow for you don’t figure into the equation this morning?”  Marissa asked, brightly curious and, again, far too close.

            “Dear Merlin, she didn’t get them in here too, did she?” James exclaimed in horror.  Marissa alone was bad enough, but Marissa reinforced by the often drunk but still merciless Sirius?

            “I’m the only one who loves you enough to get up to Surrey this early on a Sunday morning,” was her reply.  “And I might not even have done it except that I was already up when Lily called me, practically hysterical, at seven thirty.  She almost missed us, we had just walked in from Mass.”

            “How bloody early in the morning is it?” James demanded loudly, then immediately regretted the volume he had used to express his anger.

            “Almost eight,” Marissa chirped.  “At least I think that’s what you were asking.  You may want to lift your face from the mattress the next time you try to speak.”

            “Your voice is singularly annoying.  I’ve never noticed before how shrill and strident it is,” James said, burying his face deeper in the sweet, white expanse of mattress.

            “Yet another reason to look up and let my pretty face off-set my unpleasant voice,” Marissa replied cheerfully, utterly unfazed by his insults.  Even so, James was thinking of stopping them.  It was bad whenever he opened his mouth.  Hell, it was bad just thinking.  

            Marissa gave him only a few seconds of peace in order to work this out.  When his determinedly motionless position told her in no uncertain terms his opinion of her suggestion to lift his head – to move in any way – she said brightly, “So, do you want the hangover concoction I’ve got for you downstairs – it’s Sirius’s recipe: guaranteed to shrink your head to only twice its normal size – or do you want another bucket of water?”

            “I’m cold,” was all that James Potter managed in reply.  He longed to add, “I want my blanket back,” but everything hurt and he didn’t think that it would be well-received in any event.

            “I’m not surprised,” Marissa told him and he could practically see her standing with her arms folded over her chest.  “You’ve got icicles all over you – a little longer and you’re sure to catch frostbite.”

            “Does Lily _hate_ me?” James demanded, forcing himself to move a little as he started to shiver.  He instantly regretted the effort and dropped back down onto the bed.  “She had to know _you_ ’d be cruel and unusual punishment.”

            James wasn’t entirely sure that the last part had been coherent, but Marissa replied, “Actually, I’m your protection.”  James made a garbled but loud noise of dissent that was probably the best he could manage.  “Believe me, you don’t want to deal with Lily right now,” Marissa told him in answer to his grunt.  “And if she doesn’t believe that I’ve punished you properly, even a Lily straight from Church won’t forgive you any time this century.”

            James felt something tickling on the bottoms of his feet – about the only part of him that didn’t feel frozen.  “Also,” Marissa continued blithely, “I’m here to judge if you’re coherent enough to survive the fight you and Lily are going to have soon without saying anything too stupid.”

            “It’s her fault anyway,” James mumbled.

            “Like that,” Marissa replied.  The tickling started to increase in its annoyance.

            “She’s the one who drove me to the bottle,” he defended himself, mostly because his severely hung over brain thought that passing the blame would stop the infernal tickling on the bottom of his feet.  He also felt that it was true.  She was the one who had made him positively frantic about last night.

            “That’s why you need me here,” Marissa added with a supremely annoying laugh in her voice.  “To make sure that you don’t open with that.”

            Then the entire world did a belly flop.  A very painful belly flop for the one person who had decided to stay stubbornly still all morning.  The light alone nearly blinded him.  The rolling and bucking was nearly the end of his practically nonexistent stomach control.  “If you’re not going to get up and drink your hangover juice like a person, I’ll have to feed it to you the way I would a plant.”

            “What the hell does that-“ James stopped talking and trying to block the light with his hands when something slimy entered his mouth and moved almost immediately to his throat.  He bolted upright, clutching his throat and coughing violently.  “You-you’re trying to kill me!” he sputtered, hating his head for being upright and his voice for being loud.  “What _was_ that?” he demanded, trying to find a Marissa-shaped blur to attack.

            “A raw egg,” Marissa replied innocently from the opposite side of the room from the blob he had just decided to eviscerate.  “I don’t have the mixture up here so I’ll have to feed you the ingredients separately.  The next is a breast of chicken…”

            “All right, fine, woman!  I’ll drink your foul potion!” James cried, fending off an imaginary attack from a chicken-wielding Marissa.

            Despite his promise, he started to sink slowly back down onto the bed.  However, her gentle but very much despised hands forced him back into a sitting position and swung him around so that his feet hit the cold wood floor.  The tickling immediately stopped.  It was the only good thing about the change.

            A wash of scalding water hit him a moment later.  “You said Lily wouldn’t be back for an hour,” James mumbled.  He was rewarded for his effort and the stomach-churning task of sitting up with yet another blast of ice cold water.  “Stop that!” he shouted, half-rising to his feet as he yelled at her.  This nearly made him collapse back, but again Marissa’s dainty but demon hands pushed him forward and forced him to his feet.  “I need another hour of rest before I can face Lily.”

            This was a fairly good argument in his eyes.  It was also not a terribly unreasonable request.  Marissa, however, did not concur.  “On the contrary, you need an hour of grooming to make you presentable,” she replied, throwing his arm over her shoulders and starting to walk him somewhere.  He didn’t really care where.  “And an hour of sobering up to make you articulate.  Now, eyes open,” she ordered as he felt cold metal settle on his nose.

            A moment later, James Potter had never been more relieved to find himself wearing his glasses rather than some new torture device of the insane, evil, sadistic woman his girlfriend had sicced on him.

 

~*~*~

 

            Lily just laughed at his pain, much as she and Marissa had back then.  “Whatever her methods,” she said once she had calmed down, “you have to give her the fact that you were neat, combed and pleasant by the time we got home.  In fact, if it had been the first time they’d seen you, you might have made an excellent first impression on my family.”

            “Which backfired somewhat, as I recall,” James laughed.  “They thought that I was such a hardened drunk that I wasn’t very hung over from my…display the previous night.”  Lily laughed harder, smiling even as she shook her head at her husband.  “Almost the next time I saw them I wanted to ask your dad for your hand.  You know he turned me down twice.”

            His wife seemed to collapse in on herself in her laughter, bending her head down and only staying upright enough to keep from crushing the one-year-old on her lap.  Harry liked when his parents laughed and joined in.  “If I recall, you didn’t find it quite so funny at the time,” James remarked, throwing his arm over her shoulders.  “I literally had to save your life in front of them to get them to accept me, and even then I was still nervous because you did that idiotic ‘dive in front of me’ thing.”

            Although James tried not to let it show on his face, it bothered him, a lot, to feel the tension in her shoulders.  He stayed alert himself for the sound of approaching footsteps even as his ears strained to catch every lovely note of his wife’s and son’s laughter.  It bothered him more than anything else in his life that he couldn’t protect his family better than that.

            “I remember what you said after the second time they said no,” James continued, clinging to this conversation and wishing it could fully dispel the shadow cast by the demons stalking them.  “I hadn’t even realized that you knew I was going to propose.”

            Lily snorted.  “A blind man would have known that you were going to propose,” she told him.  “And what else could you have to say to my father in a room by yourselves except to ask permission to?  You were much more subtle the first time, though.”

            “Well, when we walked out of the house, with me looking dejected enough to confirm all of your suspicions,” James continued, “you turned to me and said, ‘Don’t worry about it too much, James.  At least we know one of my families will give us their ringing endorsement.’”  They both smiled, but this was a more bittersweet memory.  “You didn’t just mean Sirius and Peter when you said that.  You meant Riss and Remus too.”

            “After Sirius, I mean Riss most of all,” Lily said sadly.  “After all, she and Sirius were the ones who tricked us and locked us both in that crazy chocolate room again in seventh year.”

            “You know what makes me want to believe in Remus more than anything else?” James said, once again morosely regarding the fire.  “You remember all the craziness in sixth year?”

            “You mean when Sirius or Remus or both could have ended up in Azkaban?  And you or Snape or both could have died?  Or when Dumbledore had to modify the memory of half the Great Hall when Snape started screaming out Remus’s secret?  And then all five of you were suspended for two weeks and even when you came back Marissa wouldn’t speak to you?” Lily inquired dryly.

            “Actually, I was talking about all the stunts we pulled afterwards trying to get Riss to forgive us,” James replied.  “But now that you mention it, it certainly was quite a year.”

            Lily shook her head and punched him in the arm.  “Ow!” he cried more in protest than pain.  “We did have to go to some very desperate measures!”

 

~*~*~

 

             “Merrymen,” Marissa told the Fat Lady.  She and Lily had spent the better part of their first year trying to find out her real name only to learn that she had chosen her “nickname” herself.  It turned out that she preferred a certain degree of anonymity with the students and knew that the younger students would probably call her “The Fat Lady” even if she didn’t sanction it.

            But although she preferred a degree of anonymity between herself and the students, she had no problem butting into their lives.  When Marissa said the password, instead of swinging open, the Fat Lady put her hands on her hips.  “And I suppose you are the one that display in there is intended for?” she said huffily.  “Those four boys of yours had me hanging wide open for an hour while they lugged everything in.  They were originally going to assemble it out here where I’d have to stare at it, but I told them to take their eye sore inside!”

            “They’re not my boys,” Marissa replied, starting to walk in the opposite direction.

            “Oh no you don’t,” Lily said with a sigh, grabbing her friend’s arm and pulling her back.

            “The mad marauders strike again, and suddenly you want to see it, Lils?” Marissa demanded as Lily guided her through the Portrait Hole.  Lily noticed that Marissa had referred to the boys exclusively as “the marauders” ever since their return from suspension, and she usually added an insulting modifier to it.  Lily had no idea why, but then neither the boys nor Marissa would just ruddy _talk_ about whatever had happened that night.  It was obvious that the boys were sorry and that Marissa was stubbornly not forgiving them.  Not much else was clear.

            Lily really didn’t care.  She knew that it probably made her a hypocrite, but she was so _tired_ of this fighting.  “Let’s get it over with, whatever it is,” Lily counseled instead of screaming at her friend that she should just have it out with the boys once and for all instead of ignoring them.  Lily didn’t because she knew that it would only make Marissa call her a hypocrite and stop listening to her at all.  It was exactly what Marissa had been saying to her for a solid year about Potter, and Lily was finally beginning to appreciate how annoyed her friend must have been over the past year.  Lily had barely made it the past two months.  “We don’t want them tracking us down like last time,” Lily added as they emerged into the Common Room, bracing themselves.

            They were ready for just about anything but what they saw – the Marauder’s specialty.

            “They’d find it a little hard to chase us around with _that_ in tow,” was all that Marissa managed to say, her voice reduced to a kind of shocked and (Lily hoped and prayed) touched whisper.  Lily, for her part, could only stare mutely.

            On the far wall of the Common Room lay a very odd stack of dark blue books.  They were piled as high as Marissa was tall, packed tightly together.  The thick, tall piles were arranged so that they spelled out the words, “WE’RE SORRY.”  The apostrophe dangled in midair and several of the letters obviously needed magical help to balance.

            What was more amazing about it was that this display did what serenading her outside Gryffindor Tower a month ago had not done.  It did what flowers, candy and ten thousand actually sincere-sounding apologies, and a hundred conversations with Remus had not accomplished.  Marissa Fletcher walked over to the gigantic stacks of books and just stared at them from a few inches away.

            “Pick one up, Riss,” Remus told her, coming out from the shadows on the far side of the room.  Marissa reached up without glancing at him and lifted a book off the top of the gigantic W.  The moment that it touched her hands, the dark blue evaporated and a leather-bound book with gold-trimmed edges was revealed.  “That only works in your hands,” Remus told her.  “We know that you have a problem holding onto your books.  You lend them out and people don’t return them.  These books, however, are all for you.”

            “You rounded up – and defaced – all of my mother’s books?” Marissa asked, looking up from the small book in her hands to meet Remus’s eyes.

            “And James pulled a bunch from his house with her name in them,” Remus told her.  “The ones that belonged to her also work for Dung.  Those books make up ‘WE.’  The apostrophes is the complete works of William Shakespeare.  The rest of the first word is made up of your favorite books – some of which we had quite a time finding, by the way.”  As Remus explained, Marissa walked up and down the large display, running her hands over the books and briefly changing their color.  “The ‘S’ is the books that Sirius thinks are wonderful – unfortunately mostly comic books there.  The ‘O’ is the books that James thinks you’ll like.  Peter and I each took an ‘R,’ and the ‘Y’ is Lily’s.”

            “You helped, Lils?” Marissa asked, clutching the copy of _Purgatorio_ in her hands.  She opened it and ran her fingers over where her mother’s name was written on the inside front cover.

            “Well, I thought that I should make sure they didn’t give you lousy books,” Lily shrugged.  “They didn’t tell me they were going to create this monstrosity with my suggestions.”

            “There is one more thing,” Remus told her.  “You can shrink it down as small as you like, and if any of them go missing, they’ll appear back here the next time that you want them.”

            Marissa smiled, staring at the gift in wonder.  “This is…excessive, a tad,” she finally managed to say.

            “So, should I tell the boys it’s all right to come down?” Remus asked hopefully, glancing at her sideways as if afraid to look at her directly.

            “Tell them this is very sweet,” Marissa replied after a long moment.  She glanced down at the book in her hand, looking down as if she too didn’t dare meet his eyes, “And also tell them that this time they obviously thought about what I would want instead of giving me something generic or that Sirius would love.  They really do still know me.”  She sighed and closed her eyes, “Tell them any other offense and this would more than make up for it but…they traded my friendship too cheaply to buy it back, even for such an exorbitant price.  They have to earn it a different way.”

            “And what way is that?” Remus asked, sounding very tired and more than a little annoyed.  It was a tone that few had ever heard him use at all, especially with Marissa Fletcher.  He had clearly thought that _this_ would convince her, at long last, to forgive them.  Even _he_ had forgiven Sirius for the Willow incident.  Why couldn’t she let go?

            “I don’t know,” Marissa admitted, and she was beginning to think the _marauders_ incapable of figuring it out what it would take.  “But they have to find some way of showing me that they value my friendship above some petty schoolboy grudge.  They have no idea how much that hurt me, even now.”  Marissa didn’t sound angry, as she had so often in the past two months.  She sounded sad, hurt and very, very small.  Then Remus realized, _that_ was how they had made her feel.  However James and Snape had handled the little that they told her about that night, they had somehow convinced her that James and Sirius had risked her friendship for something very small indeed.

            James, Sirius and Peter, who had been hiding on the staircase leading to the Boys’ Dormitory, turned around and marched back up to their room, frustrated with Marissa’s stubbornness and their own stupidity.

 

~*~*~

 

            “I couldn’t believe she didn’t forgive you after that,” Lily Potter shook her head.  “Then the next day, we found out she just wanted to torture you boys for one more night.  I was so relieved.”

            “Actually, that’s not why she forgave us the next day,” James replied, surprised that he had never told Lily the true story.  “Remus talked to her later that night.”

 

~*~*~

 

            “Riss,” he called just as she started up the stairs.  She turned around and faced him politely.  “I want to talk to you about…what really happened that night.”

            “Remus,” Marissa said, taking a few steps forward, “I told James and Severus that I didn’t care about the details of what happened that night between them.”

            “Maybe you should,” Remus replied, sounding uncertain and insanely nervous.  But he was also grimly determined.

            Marissa, for her part, was surprised and confused.  About the only name that had been cleared in the garbled tales of that night was Remus’s.  Dumbledore had even told the prefects that Remus Lupin had only been suspended to spare him the initial fall-out.  So what could he have to tell her to make him look guilty and nervous?

            James and Sirius, who had been going down the stairs in search of Remus, found themselves frozen and crouched just out of sight on the stairs leading up to the Boys’ Dormitory for the second time that day.  “He’s not seriously going to tell her!” Sirius hissed in shock, starting to move forward to stop him.

            James threw out an arm to hold him back.  “If he wasn’t ready, he wouldn’t be doing this,” James told Sirius.  Words could not express what he felt in that moment for Remus Lupin, knowing that he was about to tell a girl that he adored, was practically in love with, about his darkest secret.  And why?  So that she could forgive James Potter and Sirius Black for losing her her boyfriend.  Maybe even help her find her way back into Snape’s greasy arms.

            “Come on, we’ll light our badges and pretend we’re patrolling,” Remus said, ushering her out of the Portrait Hole.

            The moment they heard the Portrait shut, Sirius said, “Cloak.”  They raced up the stairs and pried up the loose floorboard under which they hid the Invisibility Cloak.  They were both under it and racing down the stairs (an odd sight as stray limbs inevitably peaked out from under it) and out of Gryffindor Tower in a few minutes time.  “Where would they go?” Sirius hissed.  “Not just any old empty classroom, right?  Where would he consider safe?”

            After several minutes of searching, James happened to look out the window and spotted two figures approaching the Whomping Willow.  By the time that they caught up, hidden under the Cloak, Marissa and Remus were almost to the trap door.

            “And this,” Remus was telling her, “is about where James saved Snape’s life.”  Marissa just stared at him mutely.  “He came after him, at great personal risk, and pulled him back to safety.”

            “That’s what made them decide they couldn’t be at all connected with each other?” Marissa cried in consternation.

            “Are you really surprised?” Remus asked, throwing up the trapdoor.  He lifted himself up and extended his hand for hers.

            She took it and let him pull her up into the unknown.  She cast her lit wand once more around the dark tunnel even as she disappeared up.  In darkness, the two boys scrambled to get up into the Shrieking Shack before the trapdoor closed.

            “All right, Remus, you’ve shown me the secret knot on the Whomping Willow, which is apparently what Sirius told Severus about.  You’ve told me that James saved his life and where, but you haven’t told me where we’re going or what Severus’s life was in danger from down this tunnel.  You haven’t even assured me that _we’re_ not in danger from the same thing!”

            “I promise, we’re safe,” Remus told her.  James and Sirius noticed that Remus had not yet released Marissa’s hand.  Marissa seemed to notice it at the exact same moment.  Seeing her glance, Remus dropped her hand instantly and looked away awkwardly.

            Marissa looked around the room, taking in the beaten and broken furniture, the legless chairs and tables, the stuffing-less couches and pillows.  “Why are we here, Remus?” she asked, turning back to face him.

            Before he could answer, there was a tremendous crash from outside, and Marissa practically flew to where Remus was standing.  “Relax,” he told her calmly, obviously trying very hard not to hold her.  He managed to give her a few pats on the back and then release her.  “Nothing can get in to hurt us.”

            “How can you be so sure?” Marissa asked, looking thoroughly creeped out by her surroundings.  She did not stray far from Remus.

            “Because, Riss,” Remus told her, leading her to the least dilapidated couch and sitting her down gently, “we’re in the Shrieking Shack.”

            Although James and Sirius, to whom the Shack was practically a second home, applauded Remus’s sense of drama, it was probably not the most comforting thing to say to Marissa at that moment.  “Don’t worry!” he cried an instant later when he realized his error.  “It’s not haunted, I swear!”

            “How do you know?” Marissa demanded, trying to control her terrified reaction.  It was all well and good to know that Nearly Headless Nick and other ghosts were friendly and almost comical at times.  It was one thing to know that Peeves was mostly benign.  It was another to shake off her Muggle upbringing and its ideas about ghosts.

            “Because, I’m what makes the screams that the villagers hear once a month,” Remus told her.  There was a long pause after this statement.  To his great but temporary relief, Remus saw only confusion in Marissa’s eyes.

            “I think you’d better start from the beginning, Remus,” was all that she said.

            So he did.  As James and Sirius watched, unseen, Remus began a story that he had never fully told even them.  “How much do you know about a man named Fenrir Grayback?”

            “Voldemort’s using him to threaten people’s kids, right?  Isn’t that what Lizzie said was happening to her little sister?  What is he, a molester or something?” Marissa’s eyes went wide with horror the moment the words were out of her mouth.  “He didn’t-“

            “Not anything like that,” Remus assured her quickly.  “Well, the thing about it is, Grayback isn’t working for Voldemort as much as Voldemort’s using him and providing him with ready prey.  Grayback’s been terrorizing for years.”

            “Remus, what-“ Marissa started to interrupt.

            “I’ll get there, I promise,” Remus cut her off, raising a hand to silence her protests.  He took a deep breath before he began again, “My father was a born politician – I think I’ve told you that.”  Marissa nodded, looking confused but fixing her gaze on Remus.  “Well, when he was rising through the ranks of the Ministry, he made a discovery about the high-ranking Auror in charge of finding and catching Fenrir Grayback.  It turns out the man was helping him instead.  He was apparently a believer in Grayback’s cause.  When my father exposed them, they swore revenge, and, well, it’s always been Grayback’s style to go after the children.”

            Remus had barely dared look at Marissa’s face throughout this conversation.  James and Sirius exchanged another look, wondering if it was too late to stop him after all.  This was too much to ask.  Marissa would forgive them eventually.  “My parents, understandably, panicked,” Remus started speaking again before they worked up the nerve to expose their location.  “They were a little unwise about it, truthfully.  I was too young to tell, of course, and much too young to stay tamely inside the house all the time.  They should have just kept me homebound on the one night a month that Grayback was really dangerous, but they were afraid he’d kidnap me and keep me until then.  So they played it safe.  But…well, would your little brother have taken that well at the age of five?”

            Remus, with obvious difficulty, forced himself to look up at her.  “I snuck out of the house on precisely the wrong night.  I was really old enough to know better than that, but the punishment inflicted on me was a little extreme for my fault.  But in a way, I was lucky.  If Grayback had sent one of his henchmen instead of coming to see me personally, I would probably be dead.  But Grayback is a sort of specialist.  He’s possibly the only one who knows how to control himself enough not to kill his intended victim, just Bite him.  You see, he sees it as his mission to make as many new werewolves as possible.”

            Remus lifted his shirt and revealed a large, hideous scar along his left side.  Marissa reached out a tentative hand and touched it briefly.  “Five years old,” she whispered, shaking her head slightly.  “Oh, Remus,” she cried, suddenly grabbing his hand as she leaned forward, “please tell me you haven’t been carrying this around by yourself this whole time!  Please tell me you haven’t been carrying this alone, trying to keep it to yourself all these years!  It’s too heavy for you to carry it by yourself!”  She captured his gaze and held it, telling him fiercely, “Please tell me that those boys are helping you.  Please tell me that you know you can tell them.  Please tell me that they are…”

            Remus was smiling.  He seemed shocked at himself but unable to stop.  “I didn’t tell them,” he said.  Marissa immediately started to raise herself up in protest, but he grabbed the hand she was starting to wave in his face and added, “but they did figure it out on their own in second year.”

            “Well, good,” Marissa declared decisively.  Then she relaxed and settled back, leaning against the threadbare couch and Remus Lupin.  “So how do they manage it?”

            “Manage what?” Remus asked, giving her a brief look of awe and adoration before she returned her gaze to him.  James and Sirius also regarded her in surprise and new respect.  Even they hadn’t handled their first interaction with Remus after figuring it out nearly that well, and they had thought that it would be cool to be a werewolf when they were twelve.

            “Well, I know James and Sirius.  They can never be satisfied until they’ve _seen_ something,” Marissa replied, not flinching even slightly as she sat against Remus.  “And you’d never let them do it unsafely.  Not with this.  So how do they manage it?  They must be keeping you company every month now.  That would certainly explain many of your mysterious absences from Gryffindor Tower.”

            “They became Animagi,” Remus told her without hesitating.  Sirius looked very offended that he had given away their secret so freely, but James understood.  At this moment, Remus Lupin would do anything for the girl who knew his secret and, a few seconds after finding out, had curled up against him.  He would tell her anything if she would just keep talking to him as if nothing had changed.

            “Really?” Marissa sounded impressed.  “What animals?”

            “Can’t you guess?” Remus teased.

            “James is a hippopotamus!” she shouted immediately, sitting up and thrusting her hand into the air as if answering a question in class.  Remus burst out laughing, and Sirius nearly did too.  James grimaced at her unseen.

            “And Sirius is a poodle,” she continued, smiling mischievously at her effect on Remus.  Her unseen audience switched positions.  Now James doubled up in silent laughter and Sirius bristled in anger.  “And Peter’s a bunny.”

            “All very good guesses,” Remus told her between chortles.

            “Actually, you probably should buy a rabbit, Remus,” Marissa told him.  “Most people think James is talking about a pet when he refers to your ‘furry little problem.’”

            “I’ll consider that,” Remus said, throwing caution to the wind and throwing his arm around her.  Marissa seemed to automatically lean back against him, laying her head on his shoulder.

            “Do,” she said simply.  They were quiet for a moment, just resting against each other.  Then Marissa spoke again in a small voice, “Why did you tell me all of this tonight, Remus?”

            James and Sirius, who had been plotting how they could escape out the trapdoor, perked up at this.  Remus took a moment before answering, then explained, “You said that the reason you couldn’t forgive them was that you thought James and Sirius had betrayed your friendship for nothing more than a petty schoolboy grudge.  I thought that you needed to know that they were protecting something very big when they put that pressure on Snape.  It wasn’t even that they put my friendship ahead of yours.  Another friend was in greater need than you at the time.  That’s the only choice that they made, not their friendship with you or their hatred for Snape.”

            Marissa absorbed this for a moment.  Then she burst out with, “Merlin, they were stupid though!”  She shook her head, looking disbelieving.  “What was Sirius _thinking?_   I really thought that this was some stupid prank that got out of control, but _damn._   What the bloody hell was Sirius thinking?”

            James expected Sirius to make another dive forward, but he just hung his head.  James patted him on the back.  The kid had definitely messed up, but few had ever been more penitent – with regards to the trouble he could have caused Remus.  “I mean, really,” Marissa continued, “he was even stupider than _James!_   I didn’t think that was _possible_ after how he and Snape acted that morning!”  A similar pallor fell over James’s features, especially when he thought how Marissa would think him more noble than he was.  He could have kept Snape quiet without demanding that choice of Riss.  In fact, he might have made the situation worse.  Snape had, after all, tried to tell the whole school.

            “Yes, they were,” Remus agreed, “but James did it to protect a friend.  Sirius too, really.  I think he knew that Snape was close to figuring it out.  He wanted him to find out in a way that would scare the pants off of him and keep him from using it to blackmail me.  He was stupid, but he always has a method – however flawed – to his madness.”

            “They’re basically good, I suppose,” Marissa admitted grudgingly, but the smile on her face betrayed her.

            “They’re some of the best ones,” Remus agreed.  “But then I knew that from the moment that they told me that they knew.  At twelve, I knew they would be something someday, when they had the courage to befriend a werewolf.”

            “It’s not so hard when the werewolf is you,” she said quietly, closing her eyes as her head slid to Remus’s lap.  James and Sirius sincerely hoped she wasn’t going to go to sleep on top of him.  They really wanted to get back to Gryffindor Tower tonight.

            “So what are your real guesses?” Remus asked a moment later.  “You don’t really think that James’s Animagus form is a hippopotamus, right?”

            “What, you don’t think that a hippo is a valid guess?” Marissa asked cheekily but sleepily, not opening her eyes.  “All right,” she conceded after a moment, “I actually think that Sirius might be a dog.  Obviously not a poodle, but perhaps more like a Great Dane.  Something big and noble.  And inbred.  I suppose he could be a lab.  Something that will make all the girls want to pet him, which I don’t doubt he has taken full advantage of throughout the years.”

            James had to hold his hand over Sirius’s mouth to keep him from letting out a bark of laughter.  “James would have to be something fast, but graceful, like the way he flies.  I wouldn’t be entirely surprised if he were a bird.  But maybe something more like a leopard or a tiger, but then again I don’t really see him as a cat – even the great cats.  Maybe a lion.”

            “The Gryffindor thing?” and from his voice, it was clear that Remus was beginning to nod off to sleep too.

            “I was thinking the mane is more showy,” Marissa murmured quietly, letting out a tremendous yawn.  “He’d need something a little flashy, and then the messy hair could carry over.”  She shifted her position slightly, obviously getting comfortable for a long stay.  Sirius and James tried not to groan.  “Peter is something small, not immediately noticeable.  He’s the one you boys send ahead as a scout in difficult missions, so he’d be something good for gathering information.  Something wily too, maybe a small breed of cat…or even a mouse.”

            “Much closer than your last guesses,” Remus smiled, leaning his head back against the back of the couch.  They talked a little more throughout the rest of the night, but the pauses got longer and longer until James and Sirius despaired of getting back to the Tower that night.  It was clear that Remus and Marissa were going to fall asleep on the couch in the Shrieking Shack.

 

~*~*~

 

            In the common room the next afternoon, Marissa walked up behind James and Sirius who were sitting by the fire playing chess.  She simply stood behind them looking stern with her arms crossed over her chest for a long moment.  Finally, she said with obvious difficulty, “I liked the books.”

            “I knew it!” Sirius crowed, immediately turning around to face her with a fierce grin on his face.

            “I do have one question,” she said when James also turned around to face her, smiling.  “Why are they blue?”

            “Because your bookishness is your Ravenclaw side coming out,” Sirius replied immediately.

            “Why you!” Marissa cried, smacking him in the arm with the book in her hand.

            Sirius only grinned at James.  “See?  I told you that the cushioning charm on the books was a good idea in case she started throwing them at us.”  Then he removed his left arm from the sling that had cradled it ever since his return to the Castle.  “Now I can take this stupid thing off!”

            “You’ve been pretending to be injured so that I would feel sorry for you!” Marissa shouted at him, gaping at him in shock and anger.

            “Took long enough to work!” Sirius hollered back.  “And I’m also vastly amused that no one even questioned it all this time.  I just grabbed it on the train ride back, and no one even wondered, barely even asked.”

            “Why you!” Marissa shouted, launching herself at Sirius who just picked her up and swung her around.  He set her down and held her at arms length by her forehead.  She swung at him ineffectually for a few minutes.

            “Oh no you don’t, Fletcher,” he told her.  “I just got done faking an injury.  You’re not going to give me a real one!”

 

~*~*~

 

            “He never told me about it,” Lily remarked, “even years later.”

            “He never told anyone,” James corrected, “except her.  Everyone else had to figure it out on their own.”  He sighed.  “It was one of the most selfless, generous acts I’ve ever seen a friend do for anyone, much less for me,” James told his wife seriously.  He stared at the flames in the fire as if the key to clearing the Lupins’ names lay within them.

            Lily took his hand and squeezed it gently.  This was as hard for her as it was for him.  She was a member of the Gryffindor Six too, and she and Marissa had shared the smallest room in the tower for seven years.  She knew Marissa better than she knew her own sister.  But she also knew that this was a moment when she had to be strong for her husband, as he had so often been strong for her.  She had to help him see that this was the only way that they could know that Harry was safe.

            After a moment, she thought of the right memory.  “You remember the day that Harry was born?” she asked with a fond smile down at her son.  “Two weeks early and just in time to mark him from the very beginning?”

            “And you insisted on going to a Muggle hospital so that we could wipe the records and move his birthday back a few weeks, or days, or even hours later when we told the Ministry,” James added.  “So you didn’t have any relief from the labor pains.  You took it all out on my right hand, instead.  It still hurts sometimes.”

            “Oh, poor you,” Lily rolled her eyes sarcastically.  “I’ll try to be more considerate the next time that I’m in labor with your children.”

            “All right, sorry,” James said quickly.  “You got revenge by hogging him during that whole time that we got with him before the nurses took him for cleaning.”

            “If they had waited any longer, you would have gotten him,” Lily told him.  “I wouldn’t have had the strength left to hold him much longer after thirty-nine hours of labor.”

 

~*~*~

 

            At 11:59 on July 31st, 1980, Lily Potter gave a yell loud enough to be heard in the Waiting Room by two anxious Marauders.  Trying to dispel their worry, Sirius remarked that she was probably shouting right in James’s ear to punish him for his part in her long, long suffering.  Following suit, Peter wondered aloud if all of the windows in the hospital were a little nervous, certain that the next one would be shrill and loud enough to shatter glass.

            They were half right.  Lily had been taking a lot of her pain out on James in the past two days.  But in a few more seconds, it would all be worth it.

            Indeed, neither of his parents thought anything of their suffering when Harry James Potter was born, just as the seventh month died.

            His mother flopped back onto the bed in exhaustion. Her hair was wet with sweat, the veins stood out in her forehead, her face was a sickly pale and her eyes were bloodshot. To James, she had never looked more beautiful. He knew that that was a terribly corny thing to think at that moment, but he couldn't help it. She was the strongest woman that he had ever met. He pushed a few strands of sweaty hair that had fallen into her face back behind her ears. She opened her weary eyes and smiled weakly at him. "How is he?" she whispered tiredly. 

            It was difficult to imagine her only having enough energy for such a soft voice when only a few seconds ago she had been filling the room (and several of those beyond it) with her screams. "The Healers-" 

            "Doctors," she corrected quietly. 

            "Are giving him a quick once over," James answered, not taking his eyes from her. 

            Lily smiled at him lovingly as she whispered, "How can you look at me?  How can you look at me when Harry's right over there?" 

            "He's coming over," James answered, taking her hand in his and kissing it. 

            Lily smiled more widely. "We have a baby, James." She squeezed his hand weakly. "Thank you." 

            "You sure weren't thanking me a minute ago," James laughed. Then a nurse came up behind him and Lily looked up over his head to the small bundle in the woman's arms. 

            "I am now," she said in a voice full of wonder as the nurse lowered the tiny baby into his mother’s arms. She looked as if she were going to cry. She breathed deeply and blinked rapidly, then opened her eyes and stared at her son. He was, actually, a little red and squished up, but he had a small mat of black hair on his head. 

            He was still crying loudly when the nurse placed him in Lily Potter's arms, but she held him close and watched in fascination. James Potter watched in awe as his wife calmed the tiny person that had just come out of her. "Hello, Harry," she whispered, giving him a gentle kiss on the top of his head. "You look just like your father. All scrunched and dirty."

            James laughed and kissed his wife on the top of her head. She had just given birth to his firstborn son, and she could say whatever she wanted to about him. Harry's eyes, which had been closed as he was crying, opened. James smiled broadly and declared proudly, "But he'll have your eyes, Lils. Just look at them, they're beautiful." 

            "They're blue," Lily laughed.

            "All babies start out blue. They're the same shape, so they'll be the same color," James said firmly.

            "I'll let you two decide that in a minute," the nurse said, starting to reach for the baby. Lily looked most reluctant. The nurse obviously had a great deal of experience with this. "I'm sorry, but I've got to take him now. You'll be able to see him soon, I promise, but I suggest you get some rest or you won't be able to hold him." 

            "But James hasn't even been able to hold him yet," Lily complained on his behalf.

            The nurse smiled slightly, "All right, if you don't need him to stay with you, your husband can carry him down part of the way." James stood and very seriously, an expression rarely seen on his face, took the small bundle from Lily’s arms. He looked so scared as he held him; he was so careful in the way he balanced him, stiffening as if afraid to hurt him. 

            Lily actually laughed. "You're not going to break him, James." James could only stare down at his son in amazement. His son. The nurse led him out of the room.

            James looked back at his wife at the door. "How did you do this, Lils?" he whispered reverently. It was the most perfect moment of his life, but nearly as fragile as the baby in his arms. Voldemort would be after this precious treasure and try to take it from him very soon. This was a very brief peace, but all the more precious because of it’s brevity.

            For now, the world was calm and beautiful.  For now, that was enough.  Lily was almost asleep already, dropping off in exhaustion. "I'm never speaking to you again, by the way," she said groggily to her husband. 

            James smiled even more broadly, "I've heard that before." 

 

~*~*~

 

            As if he knew that his parents were talking about him, Harry babbled a bit of baby talk and clapped his hands together.  After marveling to each other that they had the most adorable baby ever, Lily continued her plan, “I think Sirius was more nervous than you were.  Peter too.  He arrived at the hospital five minutes after us.  Sirius outdid him though, he was there five minutes before us.  He had us checked in and gotten the wheelchair ready.”

            “Most of the nurses thought that he was the father,” James laughed but automatically tightened his hold on Lily’s shoulders.

            “But Peter couldn’t track down Riss and Remus,” Lily added gently.  “All thirty-nine hours I was in labor he was looking for them, but they weren’t home or at work or anywhere else he could think of.  Then, almost the moment Harry was born, Sirius spots them walking out of the hospital.”

            “They said Marissa had had a treatment there,” James picked up the much more unpleasant narrative, “but it wasn’t the hospital she had told us.  They did switch a lot in those days, but the doctors didn’t remember them.  She and Remus had that little spat about him erasing doctors’ memories again, but it didn’t seem to make any sense.”

            “No more than ten minutes later, the Death Eaters arrived.  If Sirius hadn’t seen them use the Imperius Curse on the nurse at the front desk…”  Lily shuddered involuntarily and James held her even more tightly.

            “It still wasn’t safe to move you, we had to hide you in the hospital until you had gotten some rest,” James remembered, his voice tight.  “Harry too, we needed the doctors to check him out and clean him up before we could all escape.  Thank Merlin for Sirius.  He single-handedly led them on a two hour wild goose chase.”

            “Thank Merlin for Sirius,” Lily echoed.

            “Thank Merlin for me!” Sirius agreed, bounding into the room, “especially since you two are obviously slipping.  Normally, I’d already be dead if I tried a surprise entrance like that.”

            “We heard your footsteps,” James told him truthfully.

            “We recognized your bouncing little gait, too.  No self-respecting Death Eater would skip into a house he was attacking,” Lily added.

            “You two think you’re so clever,” Sirius complained, throwing himself into an armchair facing them.

            “Think?” they replied in unison.

            Sirius gave them a look and threw his feet up on the ottoman.  To Lily, he always looked a little uncomfortable when he tried to relax his posture.  James knew he was uncomfortable and probably always would be when he was slouching.  It was a coping mechanism for him, however, so neither of them ever commented on it.  It was the same with his love life.  He dated so deliberately wildly and unsteadily as if to thumb his nose at his upbringing.

            “You’re early, Padfoot,” James remarked.  “A dangerous move if you were worried about our finely toned instincts.”

            “Nah, I knew you’d never attack _me_ ,” Sirius waved that away.  “I came because I wanted to talk to you.  You see, I’ve been doing some thinking, and I think we got it wrong.”

            “The last time you said that Lily wouldn’t speak to me for almost two years,” James told him.

            “She spoke to you,” Sirius replied, “very loudly, if I recall.  She only gave you the cold shoulder until the Defense O.W.L., then she was yelling at you all the time.”

            “Well, I did fancy myself in love with Sirius,” Lily remarked with a smile, setting down the squirming Harry, who crawled eagerly over to his Uncle Sirius.

            “And she’s apparently still punishing me for it!” James cried in mock dismay, pulling Lily closer as Sirius swung Harry up into his lap and started making faces at him.  Lily gave her husband a quick kiss to reassure him before turning back to Sirius.

            “Even if it caused some inconveniences, my judgment was proved right in the end, wasn’t it?” Sirius replied, eyeing them suggestively.  “You may have been mad at James for two years, but once you let the way I handled it go, you were happy I broke up with you, right?”

            “That’s true,” Lily conceded, snuggling up against her husband.  James leaned down and kissed her again.

            “All right, that’s enough demonstration,” Sirius told them, sticking out his tongue for Harry’s amusement.

            “Since when are you queasy?” James asked, turning around to face his best friend.  “For two years after the Love Triangle gone wrong you were telling me that I should just walk up to her and kiss her.  Now, when that’s not a horrible idea, you don’t like it when I kiss my wife?”

            Sirius just shook his head.  “The point, which I am trying very hard to make, for once,” he continued in a more serious voice as he crossed his eyes at Harry, “is that I happen to be right much more often than you two give me credit for and that, as this is a very delicate situation, I think you should hear me out.”  It was very difficult to take him seriously when he was making faces at Harry.

            They tried anyway.  “What do you think we’re getting wrong in the plan, Sirius?” Lily asked.  “Should we use Dumbledore instead of you?  We have considered it, knowing that Voldemort would never be able to capture him, but he’s so busy and we’d have to bother him for every little thing…”

            “No, I think you’ve got it right steering clear of Dumbledore,” Sirius told her, “and not just for the diplomatic reasons that you’ve stated.”  They all exchanged an awkward smile.  “We don’t need him convincing you to put the weight of the entire world on Harry’s wee shoulders,” Sirius continued.  “If our esteemed Headmaster is one of the only people that you can talk to, he might pull it off.”

            “Even if it’s true, I don’t want my son growing up in the shadow of that prophecy,” Lily said almost heatedly.  “Alice feels the same way.  I wish no one knew about it.”

            “We’d certainly have a lot less problems,” James agreed.  “But what do you think that we should change, Padfoot?  Do you think that we’re wrong not to trust Remus and Marissa?”  The hope in James’s eyes and in his heart was almost heartbreaking for his wife and his best friend to see.  It was the same hope in their own hearts.  It nearly killed them to crush it out of James, even more than to push it out of themselves.

            “I wish that I did, Prongs,” Sirius told him sadly and seriously.  “You have no idea how much I wish that I did.”  Because Harry had started to pout when the silly faces were removed, Sirius rolled his eyes again and stuck out his tongue.  “But I think,” he said while making a fish-face at the baby, “that you should change your Secret Keeper.  I’ve already talked to Peter.”

            “Sirius, we can’t ask Peter,” Lily said.

            “You haven’t, I did,” Sirius returned.  “Think about it, James.  Voldemort is sure to come after me.  He’ll know that you would choose me.  I’d never, ever betray you.  He could torture me and I’d never say anything, but as we all know after the Galloway incident, I’m not impossible to trick.”  He put the squirming Harry down on the floor so that he could look at James and Lily seriously, “I’d never forgive myself if I let the three of you get hurt.  Voldemort is human, but he’s also the devil.  There’s nothing the devil is better at than tricking people with good intentions into doing something careless, stupid, and terrible.”

            “Is this still about the Willow incident, Padfoot?” James said after a moment.  “Because you’ve grown up since then, matured monumentally.  You’ll never do anything like that to a friend again.  We trust you with our lives.”

            “Then trust me,” Sirius said.  “Say Voldemort does all of what I just said…and even if he manages to trick me, the joke’s on him.  Because Peter’s the Secret Keeper all along.  He’d never expect it.”

            “Sirius…” James started to say.  He looked up and met his friend’s eyes for a long moment.

 

_In your eyes, I wanted to see certainty.  I wanted you to look me in the eyes and tell me that you knew beyond a doubt.  That would be enough for me to decide.  So I saw it, even when later I wasn’t sure if it was really there._

            “Please, Prongs, trust me on this,” Sirius said.  “Let me protect you not just with my life.  Let me protect you from my own stupidity. We all know that I have my moments.  We all know that I’ve been tricked.  We all know that you two once ended up nearly getting killed by Voldemort because of it.  Please, let me protect you from myself.  I couldn’t live with the fact that I hurt you because I had been stupid, because I had let myself be tricked.”

            Lily and James looked at each other for a moment.  “Is Peter really all right with this?” Lily asked him.

            “Yes,” Sirius replied.  “He can tell you himself when he gets here.”

            “Okay then,” James told Sirius.  “We’ll put our lives in the hands of both of our best friends.”  A strange silence fell over their group after that statement.  They had expected to feel relieved when the decision weighing on them had finally been made.  Instead they only felt empty.  They had finally, after months and years of looking at their friends sideways, turned their backs on them.

            Lily picked up Harry from the floor and clutched him to her.  James put his arm around both of them, holding onto them protectively.  Sirius sat watching over the Potters, determined that nothing would ever happen to them again.  Not on his watch.  They said nothing else until Peter arrived.

            When he did arrive, they still said very little.  The Potters drew themselves close together and Peter stood in front of them.  Sirius stayed to witness the enchantment, standing just to the side.

            “Make sure that you tell me where this one is before he has too much fun tripping me when I can’t see him,” Sirius joked, jabbing an accusing finger at James.  James Potter laughed and snagged his wife around the waist.  “You know, it would be an unfair advantage to attack me when I can’t find you.”

            “No promises,” James laughed again.

            “I’ll keep him from getting out of hand,” Lily promised, smiling now too, glad that some of the tension had been relieved.

            “Marissa was the only one who ever had that power,” Peter said, then practically clamped a hand over his mouth.  “Once,” he amended just a split second too late to do any good.

            There was another awkward moment.  James felt like his heart would break.  Then he looked down at his beautiful wife and son who were depending on him to protect them, who trusted him and loved him as he had never thought he deserved to be trusted and loved.  He looked over at Sirius and Peter, the two friends that had been his partners in crime since he was eleven years old.  He smiled at all of them, knowing that he would never again feel as he felt in this moment.  This was the perfect moment of his life, with the four people for whom he would die.

            “Cast the charm, Lils,” he said quietly but firmly.

            As she did, James could only watch, one by one, the faces that he loved so much in awe.

 

_In your eyes, I am worth dying for._

            That night, James had a dream.  As he lay down his head without the slightest worry for the first time since before Harry was born, he fell asleep without a second thought to check the house one more time for threats.  He did not keep one eye open, sleeping fitfully.

            Instead, he threw himself into the long neglected world of his dreams and found himself back in the Chocolate Room at Hogwarts.  He was eleven again and dumping a bowl of chocolate sauce over the head of Marissa Fletcher, who responded by laughing and shoving a gooey piece of cake into his face.  He looked across the room and saw Sirius and Peter sneaking up behind Lily and Remus, who were busy spraying whipped cream at each other.  A moment later, the boys managed to pour a gigantic tub of batter on top of them.

            He looked back at Marissa as he had all those years ago, but she had been replaced by a seventeen year old Lily Evans, standing there looking vaguely angry with her hands crossed over her chest.  He looked down and saw the note that had appeared in his hands.  He read aloud, “Here’s hoping you can still work out your differences like when you were eleven.  You have, after all, been acting like eleven-year-olds lately.  Riss and Padfoot.”  He shook his head, crumbling up the note.  “Well, isn’t that just like them,” he said in annoyance, “thinking that all of our issues could be worked out with a food fight.  I mean really-“

            He had stopped when Lily smashed a piece of chocolate cake into his face.  She bounced away, laughing, but he was after her.  Grabbing a bowl of chocolate sauce, he dumped it on top of her head.  She retaliated by throwing a bowl filled with whipped cream back behind her at him.  She squealed as he grabbed her around the waist and lifted her off her feet.  He spun her around then set her down again.  They were both laughing wildly as she turned around to face him, probably to get a better aim for the gooey mess in her hand.  However, when their eyes met, they suddenly realized how very close they were.

            James couldn’t breathe or move, and he certainly couldn’t relax the grip that he still had on Lily’s waist.  “Merlin, I’ve missed you, James,” she said, sounding out of breath.  Then she kissed him.  All James remembered thinking at the time was that Lily tasted even sweeter than the chocolate that they had been throwing at each other.

            But that moment too pulled away and he was standing on the Grounds outside the Lake.  He looked up at the Astronomy Tower and could just make out the six of them sitting on the roof eating breakfast on Marissa’s eighteenth birthday.  He looked to the right and saw Marissa disarming Snape when he had whirled on them after their Defense O.W.L.  He looked to the left and saw the four of them emerging in their animal forms from the Whomping Willow.  He looked forward and saw the six of them burst out of the Castle doors after their last N.E.W.T. and run toward the Lake, throwing off their heavy robes and hats as they went.  They ran splashing into the water, Marissa throwing off the wig that she had worn all year to reveal an inch of natural blonde hair, and proceeded to celebrate their last exam at Hogwarts.

            The James watching them splash each other and laugh wildly felt insanely jealous of the James who was dunking Remus’s head under the water.  He watched as Remus helped Marissa back up onto the shore just ahead of everyone else.   He was almost overpowered with longing for the day when all of them had sat out, drying in the sun, and remembering what it had been like to spend seven years together in that Castle.

            But already they were far away.  Already he was squinting to catch a glimpse of the happy, whole group across the Lake.  Then, somehow, he was outside of the Hogwarts gates, and they had slammed shut in his face with a tremendous clang.  He looked around and saw Marissa and Remus standing on the far end of the road.  He called to them, but they turned and walked away.  He looked and saw Lily coming up the road from the opposite direction.  She placed Harry in his arms and took his free hand.

            James cast one last look back at the Castle, but he saw only an old ruin.


	4. Severus: The Reason I Came for You

**Chapter Three**

 

**The Reason I Came For You**

_In your eyes, I am someone._

 

            In the Old Days, every halfblood would have had Severus Snape’s problems.  These days, it was usually only Mudbloods who belonged to neither world.  However, Severus Snape had all the problems of the halfbloods of fifty and a hundred years ago.  Even with a witch mother from a long pureblood line, a Slytherin with a Muggle surname was destined for a hard seven years.  Even Tom Riddle had run into problems in his first years at Hogwarts.  The trouble was exacerbated by the fact that Severus Snape was Slytherin through and through and despised himself for his Muggle name as much as any of his housemates.

            Severus Snape’s life had always been hard.  It had been divided from the very beginning, and it would never be whole.  It hardly seemed possible when the first eleven years of his life were a constant battle between a mother determined to raise her son to be a Prince among wizards and a father who beat her whenever she acted like less than a perfectly normal Muggle.  Where would a child ever be able to settle in the middle of such a conflict?

            In all of his life, Severus Snape had only felt like he belonged for an all too brief year and a half out of his seven at Hogwarts.  The only moments that he had felt as if he were in the right place at the right time were perhaps a dozen stolen moment scattered over his fifth and sixth years.  The only time he had felt whole was when he had been with her.

            It made no sense.  In all of his life, she was the one person who had consistently made the least amount of sense.  He never felt less like himself than when he was around her.  He never managed to act like he did with everyone else.  He never felt like he was the person that he should be.  It made no sense, then, for her to be the only person who had ever been able to hold his world steady.

            By all accounts, he should have hated her, and she should have hated him along with all of her other little friends.  Instead, she was the only person that had ever thought that he was someone.  Not a pawn in a game.  Not a greasy outcast to be spat upon.  Not a worthless halfblood taking up good space.  Someone.

            He had never known what to make of her – the radiant blonde angel who started off promising as Potter’s enemy.  All too soon, however, she became one of the idiot’s greatest friends.  What could he make of the girl who laughed wildly at Potter’s inconsiderate pranks but leapt to pick up the pieces and comfort his victims with real sympathy?  What should he think about this girl who had tried to save him twice but had no qualms about fighting with him a moment later when he expressed no gratitude?

            The logic didn’t follow.  All reason, all sense, all of everything in his life that was rational said that he should hate her.  No one had ever hurt him as much as she had.

            So it should not hurt to see her dragged away to die a slow, painful death in the dungeons of the Malfoys’ Wiltshire Manor.  He should feel only scorn upon seeing the broken, betrayed look in her eyes as she fixed her gaze on his face.  He owed her nothing.

            She had discovered and unlocked his heart only to tear it to shreds.  She had sewn the pieces together and returned them to him only to smash it to smithereens.  By all accounts, she should mean nothing to him.

            Why then did seeing her dragged away shatter the remaining pieces of that long forgotten organ?  Why did seeing her in danger make every nerve stand on end?  Why after all these years?  Why had he never been able to forget that stupid flibbertigibbet and her unwanted charity?

 

~^~^~

 

            Eleven years old and broomsticks had already decided that they hated Severus Snape, just like everyone else.  It was his first flying lesson, and his broom seemed to have suddenly made the conscious decision to disobey him.  It was zooming about no matter how he tried to direct it back to the ground. The broomstick refused, rising and flipping, nearly dislodging him from his haphazard perch.  Madam Hooch, thinking that he was just showing off, blew her whistle repeatedly, but Severus Snape was powerless to obey her.

            Casting a longing look at the ground, he noticed the little Gryffindor blonde trying to tackle Potter to the ground. Black was restraining her as she and the redhead argued forcefully with him. The blonde Mudblood was trying to wrestle Potter's wand from him…

            Potter wasn't sparing them a glance... His eyes were trained on _him..._

            That was when he understood. Potter was controlling his broom. Just let him wait until he got down there.  He’d –

            Snape saw the blonde Mudblood draw her wand.  Suddenly his broom gave a jerk in the opposite direction. Then it jerked up again then back down until it was bucking wildly and it took everything he had to keep from falling to the ground.

            Upside down and barely in his seat, he saw Hooch rip out her own wand and holler something that gave him back control of his broomstick.

            He barreled toward the ground, refusing to show the intense relief he felt when he reached it. He instantly launched himself at Potter, not trusting what illegal curses would 

come flying out of his mouth if he used his wand.

            The blonde Muggle was trying to stop him when he shouted at her, "Why didn't you just say _'finite incantatem'_ if you wanted to help you stupid Mudblood?" He shoved her off of him so roughly that she fell to the ground, a look of startled and pained surprise in her eyes.

 

~^~^~

 

            But what did that matter after all of this time?  It wasn’t like she hadn’t listened.  She hadn’t interfered a week later when Potter and Black made his broom buck wildly before he could even mount it.  It had been four years before she interfered in their rivalry again.

            And it certainly wasn’t like she had sought his company.  When she had forced her way into a prominent position in his life, it had not been for him.  It had been for her own convenience.  She had sat next to him only because she knew that his workstation was the only place where neither her precious Potter nor Evans would bother her with their ridiculous little feuding.

            It happened very slowly and all at once, as such things must always occur.

            She and Lily Evans had been bickering about Potter, probably fighting over him, he had thought at the time.  She had eventually thrown up her hands and gathered her things, then surprised everyone by moving to the workstation where Severus Snape had always, for four full years, worked alone.

            He had snarled at her to leave, under his breath of course because Slughorn had always seemed to like her for no apparent reason.  He was usually attracted to power and skill.  “If you think that I’m going to let you cheat off me…”

            “Oh please,” she had snapped back.  Snape could barely remember her snapping at anyone.  He rather liked it better than her usual “kill with kindness” approach.  “Lily’s the top student in this class, and she does her work openly.  If I wanted to cheat, I never would have left her table.”

            “Then why are you here?”

            “Because I’m tired of defending James and sick and tired of James using me to apologize to Lily.”  Snape had not expected to see such frustration in her.  He had also been shocked by her words.  So she did have a least a little judgment?  He wouldn’t have thought it.

            But when he had tried to talk about James she had practically attacked him.  They had been silent for most of the rest of class, and Slughorn had been a little disappointed with her potion that day, proving to Snape that at least she had not been copying him.  He had thought that that would be the end of the tenuous truce between the President of the James Potter Fan Club and Potter’s greatest enemy.

            As Snape took his seat at the next class, he thought almost regretfully that it had been nice to have some companionship.  No sooner had he thought this, however, than, to his immeasurable displeasure, the stupid flibbertigibbet sat down next to him.  Realizing that he would not so easily be rid of her, Snape originally planned to shut her out.  Unfortunately for him, he was soon to find that however little power for potionmaking she appeared to possess, she had a great power for making even people who severely disliked her enjoy her company.

            It had come slowly.  In the first two weeks, they barely said anything at all.  They worked side by side, mostly silently.  Eventually, Snape realized, and then only because Slughorn had pointed out how well her potion had been made that day, that he was helping her out.  At first, he tried to say that it was only because he couldn’t bear to see it done improperly.  However, when he realized the appalling fact that a somewhat pleasant banter had sprung up between them, he had to admit that he must be terribly starved for conversation.  Their working relationship had even progressed to the point where he looked forward to potions classes even more than Defense classes, and he had to further admit that it was because he had someone to talk to during Potions.

            Not that Snape was quick to learn the often confusing rules of their friendship.  For example, she could laugh and complain about Potter to him, but he could not say one word about the true nature of that swollen-headed idiot.  This was the cardinal mistake that had led to their fight in class and ensuing detention.

            She was still angry while they were scraping snail shells and barnacles off the undersides of the desks.  How in the world the shells had come to be there Snape didn’t even want to know.  Snape similarly had no interest in talking to her if she wasn’t going to be honest or at least rational about Potter.  However, it was most annoying how she was muttering constantly under her breath as she worked.

            “Will you stop that?” he finally snapped at her.  Some days, it felt as if everything that she did bothered him.  Not quite annoyed him so much as frustrated him.  He couldn’t quite explain it.  It was probably because of what she was.  Her Muggle blood had certainly caused him enough problems with other members of his House.  In a way, however, it was almost lucky that she was a Mudblood.  Otherwise, he might be tempted to overlook that she was a Gryffindor Potter groupie.

            “Believe me,” she said, grunting slightly as she pushed her scraper hard against a particularly stubborn barnacle.  “I’d be quite happy to let you do this on your own, but I have plans tonight that I’m not interested in canceling.”  It annoyed Snape that she could make even a grunt sound dainty.

            “You and the Pot-bellied crew going to terrorize some helpless Hufflepuffs?” Snape asked sarcastically, crouching down under the same desk under which she was working and reaching over to help her with the stubborn barnacle.

            “No,” she said coldly, her eyes flashing as she shoved him out of her way and started attacking the barnacle with new fervor.  “Don’t call him that, either.”

            “Have a date with good old Jimbo, then?” he returned just as sarcastically, moving to the far side of the same desk.  Snape actually liked this sarcastic, fiery side of her, a side only he could consistently provoke.

            She stopped and looked over at him, “Don’t make me laugh.”

            “I thought I was supposed to loosen up more,” he spat a common refrain in their conversations back at her.

            “I’m annoyed with you right now,” she announced as if this was news.  She said it as if it should stop him cold.  Like she had ever desisted because he was annoyed with her.

            “And you can control what I say?” Snape challenged.

            “I can control who I spend my time with,” she replied sharply, with a great push sending a snail shell flying off the desk and skidding across the room.  It would have looked like a threat from any other person.  The angel of Gryffindor House, who had even befriended the almost universally hated Severus Snape, however, was not bartering her friendship for politeness.  It was an empty threat.

            Snape had her number.  “And you can control who you get detentions with, can you?  I’d like to know that trick.”

            “So you wouldn’t have to have detentions with a Mudblood like me?”

            Snape was shocked.  “Aren’t we in a mood today,” he replied.

            “Do you really think I’ve never heard that word before?  In fact, I’ve heard you use it about me.”  Suddenly her ferocious anger was becoming clear as well as her overreaction in class.  She must have overheard the conversation on Saturday out by the Quidditch Pitch.  “Why do you always lick Malfoy’s boots like they’re candy?”

            “I have to live in the same House as his fiancée,” he replied shortly.  Did Marissa really expect him to stand up and defend her in front of Lucius effing _Malfoy?_   To alienate a contact that could be the difference between whether he was seen as Greasy Snape the Half-Muggle or the Halfblood Prince for the rest of his life?   For what?  An unwanted companion at his Potions station?

            “Why do you care what he thinks of me?  Of you?” she demanded.  “Why have you always cared what those bigots think of your Muggle name?”

            “Oh, it’s so easy for you to judge, sitting pretty in Gryffindor where everyone pretends that it doesn’t matter in the least.”

            “It doesn’t matter in decent society!”

            “Say that when you can’t get a job in the Ministry.  When creeps like Malfoy get positions over you when you’re twice as qualified, all because of your Muggle surname,” Snape shot back at her.

            “So you barter our friendship for his fading favor?” she demanded.  “You abuse me, just because it makes it easier for you?  I really am nothing but a filthy Mudblood to you, aren’t I?”  She turned to look at him, her blazing eyes boring into his from only a few inches away.

            “I’m sorry, Marissa.”  Snape heard the words come tumbling out of his mouth in shock.  He was even more shocked to realize that he meant them.  He regretted hurting her.  He hated that he had jeopardized their friendship.  What was happening here?

            “For the record,” she said, still coldly.  “I’m a halfblood.”

            They were very close under the desk, and she had that fire in her eyes that made her look like more than what she usually appeared: a silly Gryffindor groupie.  She looked like a beautiful and powerful woman.  And she suddenly felt, inexplicably, within his reach.  Not even because she was a halfblood, but because she had felt it important to tell him.  She had met him halfway.

            He would never know why, and he would never understand it, but at that moment Snape snapped and quickly closed the distance between them, kissing her forcefully.  A few seconds later, he pulled back, shocked at what he had done.  Even more than he hated Potter, he hated the fact that he wasn’t horrified at having kissed a Gryffindor goody-goody who was obsessed with Potter.  He was horrified that she hadn’t kissed back.

            She looked shocked, but her face betrayed nothing else.  Horror and excitement were both missing from her face.  She was simply surprised.

            Then Marissa Fletcher slowly leaned forward and, a few seconds later, kissed him slowly but firmly.  Snape would have stayed that way indefinitely, if, with a great series of pops, the snail shells and barnacles hadn’t dropped off the undersides of the desks, showering them.  Marissa had pulled back, laughing.  “This has got to be the most disgusting first kiss story ever,” she had said, shaking her head.  Then, before Snape could respond, she had kissed him again.

 

~^~^~

 

            But what of all that?  Why should that matter now?  Why should that somewhat sweet beginning be enough to erase the horrible end?  She had not come to see him on her own, but she had reached out to him.  She had leapt idiotically into the middle of that duel between him and Potter after two weeks of sitting next to him in Potions.  He had been frustrated by her double stupidity.  Why would she endanger herself?  And why was _this_ the encounter that she felt she had to stop?  One of the few fair fights that Potter allowed him!

            Even after the kiss, it was not some ridiculous over-the-moon-under-the-stars-on-top-of-the-world-spinning-in-circles-soaring-up-to-the-clouds romances.  From the start, they had given each other nothing but problems.  And twice, he had laid his heart at her feet only to watch helplessly as she crushed it under her heel.

            It made no sense, therefore, for the sight of _Mrs. Lupin_ being dragged away to flatten his heart for the third time.

 

~^~^~

 

            When Dante Alighieri found himself driven from the narrow path up the mountain and lost in a deep valley of shadows, he literally stumbled over a deliverer who had been sent to him by Beatrice – the woman that he had loved many years ago and ever since.  The man she sent dragged him through hell and the penance of Purgatory, but he also led him to where Beatrice waited to show him Paradise.           

 

~^~^~

 

            Severus Snape had vowed never to meet with Remus Lupin again after the Willow Incident.  He would never forgive that night.  He would never forgive the next morning.  He would never forgive the way that Lupin had weaseled his way out of punishment.  He would never forgive that it had cost him Marissa.  He would never forgive that _she,_ the only person in his life who had given a damn about him, had married a pathetic werewolf.

            Yet Severus Snape entered the house where the happy couple had lived together for three years, slipping through the back door in the dead of night.  He heard voices from the den.  They honestly thought _talking_ would save her?

            Snape walked through the house toward the sound of the voices.  Along the way, he forced himself to look at every beaming portrait of the Lupins, with and without Marissa’s brat brother.  This was what he was returning her to, this life with a man that was more completely his opposite than even Potter ever could be.  An ineffectual man who could not save her.

            But she had made her choice, and it was not as if he had not had to accustom himself to seeing her with Remus Lupin before now.  His entire seventh year had been a painful exercise in this very feat.

 

~^~^~

 

            Word of her mysterious Muggle illness had traveled through the school shockingly slowly, for Hogwarts.  Not until she was gone for a week and then confined to the hospital wing for a month afterwards did Severus Snape give real credence to the rumor.  When he saw her in the corridors again, she walked with a cane.  Even then, she looked like she might fall without the supporting arms of Remus Lupin, who was perpetually at her side.  She looked pale and shrunken and wore her magical wig like a trophy.  Every day she had used her dwindling magical power to fashion some new ridiculous hairdo.  She waltzed (hobbled with surprising grace) into Potions with bubblegum pink spiky hair.  The next day in History of Magic she had long black curls that fell to her waist.  On days when her usual nurse Lupin was recovering from the full moon, she walked into class on Lily Evans’s arm looking like her older sister with matching red hair.

            Severus watched, unable to help her and forced to watch Remus Lupin patiently lift her up every staircase until Severus cursed the Castle that made it impossible for her to get anywhere easily.  He hated the start of pain that seared through him with every new sign of her illness and the jolt of jealousy every time he saw new evidence of her dependence on Lupin.

            But even more instructive was the day that it spread through the school like wildfire that the Muggle doctors had pronounced her “in remission.”  When he heard, from a ridiculously ecstatic little Hufflepuff he’d never seen before, Severus Snape took off through the corridors, not stopping until he found her.  He slid around a corner at an ungentlemanly speed and stopped dead to see her celebrating with Remus Lupin.  He wanted to scream at the stupid werewolf that he might drop her and undo all of her progress if he kept swinging her around like that.  Severus didn’t, however, because he caught a glimpse of the look in Marissa Fletcher’s eyes.  He had seen her look like that once before.

            Severus’s feet glued themselves to the floor.  Even though he knew what was coming, he could not move a muscle to escape.  Lupin finally set her down on the floor and gave her a crushing hug, both of them still laughing in relief and almost superfluous joy.  Severus Snape’s relief and joy, in the meantime, had been cut short.  She would not die.  Instead, she would live to hurt him, to pain him with her very existence.

            “I never could have done it without you,” she told him, pulling away enough to look Lupin deeply in the eyes.

            He pulled away like the idiot that he was.  “Riss…you don’t have to…” 

            “What is it?” she asked, concern clouding her face as she reached for his hand.

            He yanked it away like a moron.  “Don’t do that!” he cried in frustration, whirling around to face her.  “Riss, you can’t just…you can’t just do that!”

            “What?” she demanded, looking supremely confused and vaguely hurt.

            “Hold my hand!” exploded the imbecile on whom her gaze was fixed.  “It was one thing when I was helping you but if you just keep doing this to me – I don’t know what I’ll do, Riss!”  Werewolves truly were eloquence itself.

            “Remus,” she said with some dismay and a great deal of concern, “what are you talking about?”  Snape knew, and he couldn’t stand the delay of understanding between them.  The only thing worse would be when they finally managed to communicate their mutual affection.

            “Like what you  just said – you can’t say those things to me!” Lupin practically shouted, throwing up his hands.

            “Why?” she demanded.  “It’s _true._  I _wouldn’t_ have gotten through this without you.  You are the most incredible friend that I could have asked for to help me through this.”

            “Oh Riss,” he had cried, sounding tortured and turning away again.  “Don’t you get it?  Can’t you see the problem?  A blind man would know how I…”  He shook his head, and she was silent.  “Riss, you can’t say things like that to me and use the word ‘friend’ in the same sentence.  It’s too cruel.  I – I can’t stand much more of it.”

            The cloud instantly lifted from Marissa Fletcher’s face and she burst out laughing.  She stared at Lupin, incredulous and smiling.  “Merlin,” she practically shouted, sounding relieved and endlessly amused, “you really don’t get it, do you?”

            “Get what?” he asked, his voice sounding dead.  He did not turn around to face her.

            Marissa just laughed again.  She stared at him incredulously at him as she replied, “I thought you were waiting until we knew if I’d get better.  I thought you were afraid of losing me, or of making it too awkward for you to help me.  I thought you were afraid of having to avoid me for awhile.  I thought you were waiting…for today really.  I had no idea that you were really, truly oblivious!”

            “To _what?_ ” he demanded, turning around to face her.  “This is exactly what I’m talking about, Riss!  You can’t say this kind of stuff to me, making me think that you… when you really…”

            “Shut up!” she cried, still beaming and almost laughing, stepping closer to him.  “Stop saying such stupid things!  Don’t you get it yet?”

            A two-year-old would understand what she meant at this point.  Snape actually understood Lupin’s deliberate obtuseness, however.  He would not let himself admit that she meant what she was saying.  He couldn’t let himself get his hopes up that high.

            “Get what?” was his only response, looking down at her sincerely and tiredly.

            “Damn it, Remus!” she shouted, then grabbed his tie and yanked his head down until she could seize his lips with her own.  Even then, he started to jerk away, but she held him there.  After a moment, his hands reached up and cupped her face, holding on to her as gently as possible as if she were made of porcelain even as she kissed him fiercely.

            Then the fool pulled away, and started saying more stupid things.  Then again, with such a reward for saying them, he was likely to continue doing so for some time.  “Riss, you don’t – you don’t owe me anything…you don’t have to,” he could barely get it out.

            She gave a small cry of frustration.  “Can’t you ever just shut up and be happy?” she demanded, staring up at him, dumbfounded.

            “Riss, I can’t – not if you’re just doing this because you feel grateful for my help – you don’t owe me anything because of this past year…”

            Then Marissa Fletcher gave one of the heartbreaking laughs that had always made the pulses of both boys watching speed up.  When she calmed, she said the five words that hurt Severus Snape more than any others in his life: “It’s always been you, Remus.”  She shook her head at the boy in front of her and continued, “Since first bloody year, it was always you.  A blind man could have seen it.”

            Then she was kissing him again.  All at once, Snape’s power of movement returned to him and he left that corridor far behind.

 

~^~^~

 

            Or he thought he had.  The truth was that that corridor and the conversation that had taken place in it stayed with Severus Snape for years.  It had kept him from reaching out to her even in the smallest way.  Even when he heard of her relapse.  Not until she had actually married her precious werewolf did he dare have any contact with her at all.

            Seeing her with Lupin made Severus Snape wish that it had been Potter after all.  He was the boy that she had left him for after Black’s little murder attempt and Potter’s overly theatrical “rescue.”  Even if she had become Mrs. Black instead, it would have hurt less.  Black would have been like her substitute-Potter, which she had picked up when it became clear that Potter was bonkers for Evans.

            Bonkers.  Honestly.  What a word!  Severus Snape hated that he had picked up some of Marissa Lupin’s habits and that they stayed with him to this day.  She was never supposed to be that important to him.  But she always had been.

            That was why even with all that stood between him and Remus Lupin, Severus Snape came to tell him the plan.  That was why when Remus Lupin and Albus Dumbledore’s head in the fireplace turned to look at him, he said, “I know where she is.” 

            Lupin’s wand immediately dropped back down to his side.  Moron.  Like a Death Eater intent on killing him wouldn’t have said exactly the same thing.  Then again, Lupin usually would not have made that mistake.  Snape took in the greater than usual concentration of circles under his eyes, the even greater shamble of his general appearance, and the wilting, despairing weakness that made every limb hang almost limp.  At least Lupin loved her too.  Even if he was a wretched, pathetic _werewolf_ , at least he loved her too.

            “Where?” his voice sounded strangled when it escaped from him.

            “Malfoy Manor.”

            Energy suddenly surged into Lupin and with a tremendous and highly unnecessary cry of, “DAMN IT!” he pounded his fists into the wall just to the side of the fireplace.  More annoying, in this particular moment, than Lupin’s childish display was Dumbledore’s knowing smile.  Would he _focus_ for once on what was actually important?  For the protection of his sanity, Snape blocked out Dumbledore’s _banter_ , for Merlin’s sake, about not being up at the school or just coming to talk to him about her rescue.  To this day, he had no idea what response he had given him.  Perhaps he had not given him any.

            “I can enter the Manor and the dungeons without causing alarm.  I will have to be minimally recognized by the wards, of course,” Snape started to outline the plan when the easily distracted duo had finally settled down to business.  “Even those with full access, of which I am surprisingly still one, have to exit the same way that they came in.   There is only one checkpoint that recognizes me, and it would be impossible to carry any passengers or cargo either into or out of the Manor without being detected.

            “I do know of one other entrance, but I could never use it undetected.  Another operative, armed with an Invisibility Cloak, could very likely infiltrate it.  This is a minor weakness in the security design of the Manor as those who have been shown or have discovered this entrance are magically catalogued and their presence automatically announced to the nearest member of the Malfoy family the instant that they approach it,” Snape explained.  “In short, unless they attacked the moment that they found the entrance, they could never enter it undetected.  I can gain access to the dungeons and retrieve her.  I will have to meet you at the very outside walls of the dungeons because only one person at a time may pass through the walls.  I will have to evade detection for a full thirty minutes after she exits the building.  You should be able to get her out of the manor using that same entrance.”

            Dumbledore’s face was now, thankfully, serious and focused.  “As the system will have to recognize you, would any alibi attempt be laughable?” he inquired.

            “The wards themselves will have to recognize me as someone with access to the system,” Snape explained calmly.  If Lupin had asked such a question, he would have spoken to him the way he would a child.  “My specific identity should at no time be detected or recorded unless I attempt to bring anything besides my person and wand either into or out of the Manor.  To answer your question, I might as well serve my head to the Dark Lord on a platter as be without an alibi on the night that Marissa Lupin disappeared from captivity.  As it is, I will probably have to put a Memory Charm or two on Lucius.  These may prove fairly easy to break in the future considering his natural protections and proficiency in Charms.  I will have to be doubly cautious never to tread these dangerous waters with him again.”

            “Thank you,” Lupin whispered.

            Snape tried to convey in a look all of the reasons that this had nothing, or very little, to do with him.  “If you lend me your pensieve when I return to the Castle, Albus, I will show Mr. Lupin the path that he is to use.”  With that, Snape turned and left the room.   He was out of the happy couple’s house in thirteen seconds.

 

~^~^~

 

            Francesca de Rimini had an arranged marriage with a hunchback.  She fell in love, however, with his younger brother: a handsome young man named Paolo.  One day, as they read poetry to each other, the seduction of Lancelot and Guenevere reminded them too forcefully of their own hidden passions.  They fell into each other’s arms.  In that moment, they cared nothing for the rest of the world or for the trouble that it would cause them.

 

~^~^~

 

            There was never a more ludicrous couple in the entire history of Hogwarts.  At least on the surface.

            He called her the Golden Girl of Gryffindor.   She called him Severus, mostly because she learned quickly how little he appreciated that.  His name for her was sarcastic and malicious.  She was maneuvering him into a position where he would have to be pleasant to her.

            After they started dating, he called her Francesca.  She called him Paolo or Dante every now and again as a joke, but for the most part, she still called him Severus.  She and he were both happier with their dynamic when she was acting just a little manipulative.  It made them feel more alike.  They needed every little bit.

            She was the President of the James Potter Fan Club.  He was Potter’s Enemy Number One.

            From the start, their relationship was not an easy one.  Both of their friends flipped out, for starters.  They both flipped out themselves, a little.  But they both knew that it wasn’t as wrong as it sounded, not as wrong as if felt to everyone else.  Despite their vastly different temperaments, friends, views and backgrounds, there was something that made it okay, that kept it from being truly wrong.  It was crazy, it was mad, it was weird, it was awkward, it was hard, but so was all love.  They had been swept away by a force that they did not understand, and who was to say that it would necessarily carry them to a place where they did not want to go?  Could it not just as easily bear them to safe harbors and happy shores?

            The Slytherins expected Snape to amuse himself for awhile by using the relationship to freak out her friends and then drop her.  The Gryffindors expected Marissa to come to her senses fairly quickly.  They were both proved wrong when the relationship continued steadily.  At first, they kept their relationship separate from the rest of their lives, coming together only when the two of them would be alone.  However, as the relationship stretched beyond one month, then two, and showed no signs of fading away, Marissa was eventually drawn slowly into the Slytherin circle, meeting the great heirs of the Old Wizarding World.

            Once there was sufficient proof of the fact that her mother was Olivia Newton, once a great pureblooded witch who had dropped off the face of the earth twenty years ago, her presence was grudgingly tolerated.  She didn’t mention that her mother had married a Muggle and foresworn magic, more because it was painful to think of the mother who had died giving birth to her younger brother Gus than to keep from shocking them.

            The respect that she showed to those children of the great families, who from their manners, talent and brilliance had earned it, made her a part of the circle.  She was never for one second not a Gryffindor.  She never for one second belonged.  But she knew them, and they knew her, and despite themselves, they acknowledged that she was good company and not a burden to have around.  So when, on December 13, 1975, she entered the Slytherin Common Room on Severus Snape’s arm, there were raised eyebrows at her daring and Snape’s gall, but they spent the evening talking with the couple pleasantly.

            Marissa’s friends could not be made to accept Snape, the boys at any rate.  However Marissa railed at them, however many times she pointed out their hypocrisy and their greater reluctance than the Slytherins to accept new people, they could not be convinced to look on Severus Snape with anything but hatred.  Remus Lupin tried, for Marissa’s sake, but the two of them had nothing to say to each other, and he dared not offend those friends that were risking so much for him by going far enough to be truly friendly with the Enemy Number One.

            The Gryffindor girls whom Marissa had befriended opened up a great deal more.  Lily Evans exchanged cold civilities with him.  Marlene McKinnon, a seventh year, could have a full and lengthy conversation with him, but then she was another born and bred in the polite upper society of the Wizarding world, from another of the Great Families.  Alice Watterby, a sixth year, was quite willing to give him a chance, but though they were not hostile, they could find nothing in common to speak of and quickly severed any meaningful ties.  Snape managed to choke out pleasantries with the Mudblood, talked almost enjoyably with the respectful pureblood, and managed not to point out the halfblood’s stupidity.

            It was a bridge that the two formed by the strength of their wills.  True, it was only a small part of Slytherin and Gryffindor that accepted and conversed with the enemy behind their lines, but it felt like more cooperation because there was seldom any at all between those two houses.  Marissa and Severus, for their part, were surprisingly happy in their relationship and happily surprised at how well it worked.  Although it often produced a shudder for some to see, they walked hand in hand in the corridors.  Marissa would chat merrily at him, with Snape remaining mostly quiet.  Every once and awhile, however, Snape would let out a loud bark of laughter when she had, obviously, gone too far in the ridiculous yarns that she spun for his and her own amusement.

            They studied together in the library, silent for hours at a time, but often stepping in to help each other in certain areas.  Both of their marks improved in all of their common subjects.  They spent Hogsmeade weekends in Three Broomsticks, the moldy old bookshop, and Zonko’s.

            For one short year and a half, an alliance formed between Hogwarts’ resident little ray of sunshine and the greasy boy with a rain cloud hanging over his head.

            But that short year and a half was over, and Snape would have doubted its ability to make him betray his surest alliance within the Dark Lord’s forces until the second he saw Marissa Lupin yanked down into the dark, dank dungeons to meet her doom.  He had not fully believed in the potency of that brief spell of happiness until he found himself slipping quietly through the deceptively run-down small wrought iron gate on the far edge of the Malfoy property.

            The moment that he was inside, he pulled up the hood of his dark cloak, disillusioned himself, and moved as quickly as he could through the shadows.  When he had to pass through an open area, he moved at a steady, measured and unhurried pace that made his heart pound faster than the sprints in the darkness.

            To avoid thinking about how it was utter suicide to be taking an active Order mission, Snape thought idly that it was somewhat fitting for Lucius Malfoy to be the catalyst of his and Marissa’s brief reunion.  After all, Snape’s comment to Malfoy had provoked the argument that led to their first kiss, and Malfoy’s comment to Snape had precipitated their first split.

 

~^~^~

 

            “Really?  You really want to have a fight about this?” Marissa demanded, folding her arms over her chest at her boyfriend in the middle of the Great Hall after breakfast on the morning after the third Quidditch Match of the year.  “You really want to cancel our date today?  Seriously?”  Her tone had the rare (for Marissa) expression of contempt.  In truth, she was probably the only person in the entire school that was surprised that her boyfriend was upset with her.  She and the other members of the James Potter Fan Club had created a massive collage of their idol’s face in the sky over the Quidditch Pitch.  Storm clouds had formed the messy hair, sunset red and oranges had formed his lips and face, and, except for the blue eyes (sky showing through), it was a surprisingly accurate replica of the star Chaser’s face.  It had disappeared the moment that Madam Hooch blew her whistle, but it was still what Ravenclaw blamed for the loss of the game.  After the Ravenclaws, the Slytherins had by far been the most horrified and contemptuous of this.  And Lucius Malfoy had come to see the match with his betrothed.

“I think that my girlfriend decorating the entire sky with another guy’s face yesterday merits a fight,” Snape replied, likewise setting his jaw and taking up an aggressive stance.  “Can you even imagine what that felt like?  To see that _thing_ up there and know that it was your handiwork?  You are _my_ girlfriend, Marissa.  Not his.  So kindly stop acting in such a way that suggests you are a pathetic floozy hopelessly obsessed with him.”

Marissa’s eyes smoldered with dangerous anger.  By this point, the half of the school that rose before noon on Sunday had all stopped to watch.  Marissa and Snape’s romance had been an object of morbid curiosity for the entire Castle.  What could one of the most popular girls in the fifth year – a Gryffindor to boot – want with easily the least popular boy in the entire school?  And what possessed the most overzealous Slytherin bigot to want to date a Gryffindor Muggle-born (the fact that she was a halfblood was not yet well-known)?  What was more, they had seemed to be truly happy with one another.  She had even made him laugh regularly, a frightening sight, and he was both a perfect gentleman and eager to talk (politely) when she was around.

But now, the first signs of trouble in Incredibly Bizarre Paradise were on display for the fascinated (and in many cases highly disturbed) student audience.  It was also strange to see Marissa Fletcher dangerously angry.  She was easily the most easy going of her year, especially among the Gryffindors, and until now had never been know to get into a fight with a Slytherin.  She looked scary now though, standing perfectly still with her eyes flashing.

Snape didn’t seem to notice or care if he did.   “Are you just going to stand there?” he demanded with contempt lacing his own tone.

“I was giving you a chance to retract your idiotic statements,” Marissa replied, her anger plainly revealed in her voice.  “Because I know that you couldn’t possibly think that it is okay for you to try to dictate to me what I can and can not do.  Who do you think you are?”

“Your boyfriend!” he returned over her.  “And I am entitled to –“

            “What?!” she yelled over him.  There was a collective gasp.  Marissa had never interrupted someone before.  It was undoubtedly this mild, laughing girl’s pet peeve.“Do I have to check every action with you?  Do I have to ask, please and thank you, before breathing because you’re my boyfriend?”

            “Don’t be stupid!” Snape shouted even louder, just as angry.  There was another collective gasp from the captive audience.  He had not insulted her, at least in public, since they started dating.  It was clear that most of these emotions had been simmering for some time under the surface of Incredibly Bizarre Paradise.  It was also clear that he might have gone too far, for she seemed to involuntarily start forward as if to strike him.  Snape didn’t seem to notice, for he went on, “Do you have any idea what it was like for me yesterday?  After the Match with everyone talking about your idiotic stunt?  Do you know what it was like sitting down in the Slytherin common room and listening to their voices, dripping with disdain, laughing and making you out to be the worst kind of lunatic?”

Now, it was undeniable that he had gone too far and that he had said exactly the wrong thing.  Marissa had gone perfectly still and her eyes, though still fixed on him, no longer seemed to be trying to bore holes in his head.  When her voice came it was in a very quiet and rigidly controlled tone.  “You just listened to them?”  Snape stopped too.  “That’s all you did?  That’s all that you had to suffer?”  The entire Great Hall had gone silent now.

“Fran,” he said carefully and firmly, reaching out his hand as if to calm a wild beast rather than his girlfriend.

            She waved her right hand and he fell silent, starting to speak but finding himself unable to be heard.  He looked furious but also very wary of her new mood.  “Severus, I turned a blind eye when you let everyone think that you were only dating me to annoy James Potter, because I know that it made things easier for you.  I didn’t say anything when you called other girls Mudbloods because I gave you the benefit of the doubt, assuming that you don’t realize that the person you’re really calling a Mudblood is me.  I’ve been giving you the benefit of the doubt and assuming that you don’t know how much it hurts me every time you say that word.

“But it’s becoming increasingly clear that you do not respect me at all.  You don’t defend me, you don’t listen to me, you won’t call a truce with James Potter for my sake, you introduce me to your allies and parade me around your common room only to listen calmly when they laugh at me and ridicule me for trying to befriend them _for your sake_ the moment that I leave the room.” Marissa stopped for a moment, her deadly quiet voice still ringing in the eerily silent Great Hall.  “Do you even really care about me?” she demanded, a little louder.  “Do you?  Tell me, is this all an elaborate prank on James Potter after all?” she practically yelled.  “Answer me!” she demanded even louder.

She waited a second then, remembering in annoyance, jerked her hand and released him from the spell.  Snape almost launched himself at her the moment that she was free.  “You hypocrite,” he spat.  “You don’t mind me pretending, do you?  You want to know the truth, _Francesca?_   You don’t ask me to say that I’m dating you for you or give up my grudge against James Potter or stand up for you against my own friends because you don’t think that I will.  You think that I don’t care about you enough, and you’re afraid to admit it to yourself.  You’re afraid to say it.  You’re afraid to think it.  But it’s true.  You don’t dare test us.  You don’t dare test me, because you don’t trust me.

“And come to think of it, when was the last time that you made any of these gestures?  The last time that you broke in when James and I were dueling?  It’s been awhile, hasn’t it?” he cocked his head to the side, mimicking one of her common gestures.  “You’re afraid to choose between us and you’re afraid to ask either of us to choose our affection for you over our grudge against each other.  You’re afraid that we hate each other more than we care about you.  Well, _sweetheart,_ I guess we’ll never know, will we?  Because you don’t trust me enough to even ask!”

“Trust you?  How could I trust you when you don’t respect me?” Marissa shouted.  “When you won’t even admit your feelings towards me except under duress?  When you try to hide it from all of those you associate with as much as you possibly can?  You sweep it under the rug, hide it behind your back, and I’m sick of pretending that you have any respect for me at all when it’s clear that I’m just an embarrassment to you!”

“Am I supposed to crow down in the Slytherin common room about my Gryffindor girlfriend?” Snape demanded.  “And her _hilarious_ portrayal of my arch nemesis’ head in the clouds?”

“If you’re so embarrassed by it, maybe I can solve your problem!” Marissa shouted back.  “You don’t have a Gryffindor girlfriend anymore!”  She whirled and started toward the staircase.  The crowd parted in front of her.  She barely seemed to notice.

            “What the hell does that mean?”

            “It means stay the hell away from me, Severus Snape,” She snapped back, beginning to ascend the stairs and not so much as glancing back.

            “Fine, I hope your cauldron explodes on you without my help in Potions,” he said, whirling around and making a similar exit toward the Slytherin dungeons.

 

~^~^~

 

            So why was he doing this?  It wasn’t lasting, true love if it could fracture that easily!  Why the bleeding hell was he risking everything – life, position on both sides of the War, reputation, and what was left of his heart – for a fling years ago at school?

            It made him angry to think how terribly little logical sense his actions tonight made.  That was one thing that Severus Snape had always prided himself on – acting on cold reason.

            He slipped into the dungeons through an invisible door still seething more at himself than her.  Why had he always let her control him?  Let her yank his life around in an erratic orbit?  Even when he was not her choice?  When she had never told him that she loved him, never given him some fleeting promise to always care for him, never shown similar lingering devotion to him?  Except, of course, in her glance back at him as she was pulled down to her death.

            He heard a guard about to turn down this very corridor and dove into the shadows.  Until the hulking figure of Goyle had passed by and his footsteps faded, Snape could think and feel nothing but relief that Malfoy had not updated the dungeons but left them dark, dirty and full of shadows.  And that he used docile imbeciles like Goyle to guard them.

            When Snape could move again, he realized that he knew the answer to his bitter, disbelieving questions.  He had always known why even after all these years he could not forget her.  It was because of the look in her eyes when she saw Potter tormenting him.

 

~^~^~

 

            That should have been simply that.  The break up had certainly been mutual and passionate enough to be final.  The wild differences in their character should have made it easy to get over the relationship quickly.  But it tortured them.  That was obvious from the start.  Snape hated every minute of their separation and hated even more each new proof of his lingering attachment to the silly little girl.  He couldn’t actually speak for Marissa, but she would flinch violently at each new torture device in the horrendous series of attacks from the Pot-bellied crew.  She would be silent for hours afterwards.  That was certainly saying something.  The silly flibbertigibbet never shut up.

            It wasn’t for months, until the Defense O.W.L., that Potter and Black went too far, for everyone concerned and even for some whom it definitely did not concern.

 

~^~^~

 

            “Leave him ALONE!” 

            Ambushed and temporarily disabled by James bloody Potter, Severus Snape couldn’t decide whether to snarl or be pleased that Marissa Fletcher had leapt to his defense.  There was no relief of anger or spike of disappointment when he discovered that it was Lily Evans, and not Marissa, but only a redoubling of his fury.  So she didn’t care about him.  That was just fine.  The indifferent redhead who usually laughed had leapt to his defense, but his _devoted_ ex-girlfriend had not.

            Snape sat there seething in fury at Potter and embarrassment at the situation and hating him with everything in his body not even because he was heartless and cocky and loved to make his life miserable.  He hated him because Marissa had never once chosen Snape over her pet idiot, because even now she would not leap to his defense against her _precious_ Potter.

            With a great effort, he pushed through Impedimenta and his hands closed on his wand.  He sent his hate rocketing toward Potter, the spell sending blood spattering across his face and robes to Snape’s satisfaction.  Snape looked for her face in the crowd, wanting to punish Marissa too when he hurt her precious Potter.

            Too long he was distracted.  Dangling upside down in the air under the power of a spell of his own design, Severus Snape felt his fury build even more as Lily Evan’s voice argued with Potter.  The voice which should have been Marissa’s.  He fell to the ground at Potter’s command, again immobilized by Black.  Two on one, what Gryffindor chivalry, boys.

            “You were lucky Evans was here, Snivellus,” Potter snarled after he released him at the end of his argument with Evans.

            “I don’t need help from filthy Mudbloods like her!” he shouted.

            Then Snape, sprawled where he had fallen on the ground, caught sight of the stupid blonde flibbertigibbet herself.  She was sitting next to the spot where Evans had stood up.  Her hands were over her ears and her eyes were closed, her face was twisted as if she were being tortured.  Tears were running down her face.  She had told Evans to defend him for her.  He could imagine the conversation: “Anything that I say will make it worse.  Please, Lily, stop them.”

            Snape wanted to snarl at her that the only help he wanted less than the Mudblood’s was her own.  She had made her choice.  She had no right to care for him anymore.  Bugger off, Fletcher.  You have no right to look as if any of this pains you.  You always chose him.  You love my tormentor and hate me.

            “So, who wants to see me take off Snivelly’s pants?” James’s voice called out.

            “James,” Remus Lupin’s voice called out urgently.  James turned around.  Snape twisted to see their silent conversation.  Remus nodded toward the huddled Marissa who was rocking back and forth in her distress.  James’s wand arm relaxed.  The fool, the weakling, to be so easily manipulated and controlled by a girl that he had already won.  A girl he had already won and discarded.

            As if she had heard his last thought and it was the final straw, Marissa leapt to her feet, her wand drawn, and fired at James Potter.  “ _Expelliarmus!_ ” she shouted, her voice full of tears.  Snape started to drop, but she levitated him gently to the ground.  Once his feet hit, all five boys stood staring at her in shock.  No, make that the entire year.  Lizzie Walker, a Ravenclaw friend and fellow prefect of Marissa, took a few tentative steps toward her.

            Tears fell down her cheeks and her voice shook.  “How could you?” she asked, fixing her gaze on James Potter, looking more hurt than he had ever seen her before.  “Why would you do that?” she asked in a whisper.  She shook her head at him.  “Leave him alone, James.”  She bowed her head as if to hide the sobs that burst from her a moment later.  “Oh Severus, I’m so sorry,” she cried, then turned and ran for the Castle, taking James Potter’s wand with her.  Just before she was out of easy firing range, she summoned Sirius Black’s right out of his hand for good measure.

            Snape immediately whirled on them, only to find his own wand fly out of his grip.  “WHY ARE YOU ALWAYS SUCH AN IDIOT?” Marissa shouted at him, holding the three wands of the boys and fixing each of them with a look that could kill.  Then she turned and again ran for the Castle.

            This time, Snape took off after her.  He caught up with her in the Entrance Hall and, grabbing her arm, dragged her into the nearest classroom.  “Me an idiot?” he had shouted in her face.  “Who asked you to intervene?  Who asked you?”  He shook her.  “Why would you do that?”

            “Well I certainly didn’t do it so that you could attack them the moment that I had disarmed them!” she spit back in his face.  “What about all that blustering nonsense about a fair fight?”

            “You defended me!” he accused her, throwing up his hands then grabbing her again to keep her from escaping.  He pulled her close to him until her face was close enough that he could see every twitch of expression and every one of the crashing emotions swimming in her tear-filled eyes.  “Why would you do a stupid thing like that?”  He shook her again.  “You still care about me!”

            “Of course I do!” she shouted back at him, furiously.  “You think that that vanishes when you break up with someone?”  Her eyes suddenly turned cold. “Is that how quickly your own affections faded?”

            Snape answered her by pulling her the few inches closer and seizing her mouth with his own.  He held her in a vise-like grip by her shoulders and kissed her fiercely, but it was not necessary to hold her there.  She was kissing back and wound her arms around him, trying to pull him even closer.  They fought each other with their lips, engulfed in the long denied pleasure.

            When they, several minutes later, broke the kiss, they immediately released each other and stepped to opposite ends of the classroom.  Marissa started pacing.  “Can you – can you remember why we broke up?” she asked somewhat breathlessly after a very long moment, staring at the ground but shooting looks up at him almost with every other step.  “Does any of that seem important now?”

            Severus Snape waited another long moment.  Then he said the first lie he had ever spoken in his entire life, “No.”  He knew that the issues that had broken them were not gone and were not insignificant.  He just knew that he would rather work them out with her this time.  He also knew that his answer was what Marissa needed to hear in order to try again.

            “Well then,” she said, finally stopping.  “Well, then.”

            “Yes, ‘well, then,’” Snape replied, almost smiling as he mocked her.

            “The practical will be starting soon,” she said, starting to walk out of the door.  It took him a split second to remember about the O.W.L.s.  He started toward the door a moment later and arrived at the same moment she did.

            “I’ll see you later then,” he replied, opening the door for her.  They exchanged a ridiculously awkward and chaste kiss goodbye considering the snog session in which they had just indulged.  Then they rejoined their class and started mystifying the school again with their persistent relationship.  What mystified Snape was how he had not remembered to reclaim his wand from the silly girl.

 

~^~^~

 

            In a way, it was almost a shame that James Potter wasn’t there.

            Snape stopped in sheer surprise.   He had never imagined that he would think that sentence without reference to the scene of some mass murder.

            As he continued walking, he had to admit that it would have been appropriate.  Then not only Malfoy but Potter could have been a part of the brief reunion of the couple that each boy had inadvertently put together and intentionally ripped apart.

            He reached the door to Marissa’s cell and wondered for the thousandth time in two days why the bleeding hell he was doing this for a girl who would not have done the same for him.  Hadn’t she proved that the morning after the Willow Incident?  Hadn’t she made it perfectly clear where he rated?

            Yet Severus Snape reached out his hand and began to magically turn the levers in the lock.  This was the kind of magic that only halfbloods ever bothered to learn, the blending of Muggle techniques with magical skill.  Purebloods were too cocky and Mudbloods were too proud of their new status in the magical world.  A few halfbloods, however, used this refined brand of magic.  Muggle safecrackers had to use instruments or a refined sense of touch and hearing, but a wizard could use magic to trigger the same tiny levers to open a locked door.

            It took more time than _alohomora_ , so most didn’t bother.  But _alohomora_ could be blocked easily, and no one thought to block this technique, especially in the thoroughly purebred Malfoy Manor.  As he began to work his little-known magic, Snape could not help but reflect on the moment when Marissa Lupin had slammed the door in his face.

 

~^~^~

 

            Francesca de Rimini and her lover Paolo were discovered almost immediately by her husband.  He killed them on the spot.  Dante encountered them in the second circle of hell being tossed about by fierce and terrible winds for eternity.  He fainted in pity for the two souls led astray by a momentary passion.

 

~^~^~

 

            The relationship between Marissa Fletcher and Severus Snape did not wind down and fall away.  They did not part amicably.  It did not fade away or dissolve or weaken into nothing.  It did not lose its spark and smolder slowly away.

            It shattered.  Into ten thousand pieces.  Ten million.  Too many pieces to ever be counted so small that they could never be found to count in the first place.

 

~^~^~

 

            “Are you all right?” Marissa cried as she burst into the Hospital Wing.  She pelted straight for the beds that held Severus Snape and James Potter.  She was nearly there when Snape stopped her.

            “Who are you going to?” he asked quietly.

            Marissa stopped, confused in her already highly charged emotional state.  She stared at him, then looked to Potter.  As they both appeared to be in one piece, with no visibly shattering injuries, she simply stayed still.  “Excuse me?” she asked Snape mildly.

            “Who are you going to?  Your boyfriend or me?” Potter asked, in the same tone as Snape.  It was bizarre to hear such a similarity in their voices.

            “I came to see you both,” Marissa said in a very soft, careful tone.  She had closed her eyes for a moment, however, as if bracing herself for a blow.  Knowing them as well as she did, it was not impossible that she sensed what they were about to do to her.

            There was a profound silence for several seconds after this quiet but immediately intense conversation.

            When Potter looked like he was about to speak, Marissa cut in very seriously,  “Before we get into this, was everyone else all right?  Peter sent me here, but Remus, Sirius?  Was anyone with you, Severus?”

            “Sirius was sent home – in one piece.  Remus is behind that curtain over there,” Potter told her.  “He’ll be back to normal when he wakes up.”

            “I went alone,” Snape replied.

            The space between the two enemies was as cold as the ninth circle of hell, and the ice was appropriate, considering they were about to force Marissa to betray one of them.

            “You told me when you and Snape started dating that if I ever asked you to choose me or him, then you would automatically choose him,” Potter said by way of beginning.

            “You told me the same thing,” Snape added.

            Marissa looked down for a moment.  “So you’ve found the loophole,” she nearly whispered.  “Truthfully, I never expected you to.  Who would have thought?  If you ever managed to work together and communicate, why would you still need to push this ultimatum?  And if you stayed enemies, you could never team up on me.”  There was a moment of silence between them that spoke volumes.  It heaved and roared the way that the most turbulent words never could.  “Well, go on then.  Ask me what you’ve decided you have the right to demand of me.  Just because I know what it is doesn’t mean that I’m not going to make you say it.”

            “Last night – “

            “I don’t care,” Marissa cut Snape off abruptly, the steel of anger in her voice.

            “I wasn’t going to tell you what happened,” he replied mildly, staring her down steadily.  “But it became clear that we could no longer pretend to any sort of association, even for your sake.”

            “Is that all I’ve ever been to the two of you?  A rope in your stupid tug-of-war?” she asked quietly, sounding more hurt than either of them had ever heard her sound.

            “You have to choose, Riss,” Potter said mercilessly.  “Him or me.  Neither of us will talk to you until you choose.”

            Marissa closed her eyes and took a deep breath.  Then her eyes snapped open blazing with anger and filled with pain.  “I want you to know,” she said in a deathly quiet voice, “that I will never forgive either of you for this.”

            After a moment, she continued, “Especially you, James, because you know that I would be nothing without you.”

            He had the grace and sense not to celebrate.  Marissa immediately marched to the curtain and threw it back.  The boys had the chance to see her sit down in a chair beside Lupin’s bed before she snapped the curtain shut again.

            Potter had been discharged by Madam Pomfrey first.  Looking vaguely penitent, he walked over to the curtained-off bed and started to pull it aside.  Snape heard Marissa hiss at him,  “Get out.”

            “Riss-“

            “If you ever want me to speak to you again, _get out_.”

            He did, striding out of the wing looking very concerned indeed.  But what did it matter if she were mad at him for a few days?  What did it really matter if she never spoke to him again?  He had won.  Just like everything else in his entire life.  Potter had never known what it felt like to lose.

            James Potter would never even know who Marissa Fletcher really was.  He would never understand what it was about her that made her so special.  It wasn’t her infantile pranks or her fool’s wit wisdom.  It wasn’t her friendliness or her mothering habits.  Those were mostly just annoying distractions.  Potter would never understand her.  Someone who was fawned over by groupies, who had friends in spades, who had never had to work for affection or loyalty in his life, would never understand what Marissa Fletcher was to those who had no one else in their lives who had cared about them unconditionally.

            After a few more agonizing minutes, Snape was cleared to leave.  He had meant the entire time that he was putting on his robes from last night to immediately walk out of the Hospital Wing without a backwards glance at the girl who had betrayed him.  Instead, he started walking and found himself standing just on the edge of the curtain.  It was such a flimsy, stupid barrier to divide him from her, really.

            He had meant, then, to yank it aside and reclaim her for once and all.  He had longed with everything in his shriveled and trampled heart to reach forward and sweep away anything that separated her from him.

            Instead, he had turned smartly on his heel and walked away.

 

~^~^~

 

            With a small ping, the door swung open a fraction of an inch.  Severus Snape hesitated on the threshold of Marissa Lupin’s prison cell.  Why was he doing this for a woman who had done that to him?  Why?  Loyalty to a Hogwarts Sweetheart was one thing, but this?  Why had sense, logic, and reason always deserted him around this girl?  They were the principles upon which he lived his life, and she wiped them away as if they were nothing.  She had chosen Potter; she had married the werewolf; let her rot here for all he cared.

            But there was never any question of whether or not he would open the door.

            The sight that he saw there froze his blood and stopped his abused heart cold.  In the middle of a small room of dark, dirty stone, lay a white figure, perfectly still.  Dried blood was in the long blonde hair that covered her face.  Her hands were limp and she looked as if she were already dead.

            Snape flew to her side, gently turning her over even as he magically removed the blood.  He pushed the dirty, matted hair out of her face.  She did not rouse.  He pulled a small vial out of his pocket and poured it into her mouth.  After a terrifyingly long pause, she started to blink awake.

            Snape hated how his shoulders relaxed and how the relief flooded through him.  In a few minutes, she would be once again as good as dead to him.

            But she would be alive and free.  If he hurried.

            “Severus?” she murmured, sounding confused, blinking as if he would disappear.

            “We haven’t much time,” he told her, lifting her gently but quickly.  It was clear that she would not be able to walk.  “Lupin is meeting us on the edge of the dungeons.  He’ll take you the rest of the way.”

            “My, my, did you two boys finally learn to play nice?” she mumbled weakly, allowing her head to hang but glancing up at him with her eyes as if reconsidering him.

            Snape did not favor her with an answer.  He simply draped his dark, disillusioned cloak over her as much as possible.  She was breathing shallowly, and he worried about actually covering her head.  He carefully shut the door behind him.

            It disturbed him how lightly she rested in his arms.  She was dead weight, barely able to even hold onto him.  And she had started shaking, almost uncontrollably.  He held her tighter and tried to calm her as much as possible while hurrying through the corridors exactly one minute and forty-five seconds ahead of Goyle.  It disturbed him how much her obviously poor condition disturbed him, but then he shouldn’t really be surprised at this point.

            “You never,” she practically gasped quietly, interrupted by a sudden spasm of shaking.  When it subsided, she continued in a hoarse whisper, “You never asked me why I chose James.”

            Was she actually surprised by this?  He had forgotten, having such limited contact with her, how truly stupid she could be sometimes.

            “Olivia and Cynthia Newton were sisters,” she said a moment later, “who eventually became Livy Fletcher and Cindy Potter.”

            Snape actually stopped dead.  She was a _Potter_ all this time?  “So, you see,” she continued softly, “I couldn’t choose you over my brother.”

            “Brother?”  The word escaped Snape at a volume that was just short of being dangerously loud.

            “Cousin, whatever,” she murmured, letting her head fall back against his chest, too tired to hold it up anymore.

            “You once told Lupin,” he started to say.  The words burst out of Snape against his will.  It was 11:34, and he was two minute’s walk from the rendezvous point, but he couldn’t move until he had asked this question.  “You once told Lupin that it was him from the beginning.  That it had always been him.”

            “Yes, I did,” she whispered.

            “Even when we were together?” he asked and hated himself for it.  He shouldn’t care, and he had no real desire to know.

            “I wouldn’t have left you for him,” she replied.

            “But you knew that we wouldn’t last,” he continued for her, knowing that she wouldn’t say the truth.  He started walking again, back in control of himself.  “Because you were already in love with Lupin.”

            She said nothing.  She didn’t need to.  One of the things that Snape had always found less repugnant about her than other people was that she knew when unnecessary words could be avoided.  So few people really did.

            “I really don’t know where the Potters are,” she whispered a moment later.  “They didn’t even tell me who their Secret Keeper is, or if they went ahead with the Fidelius Charm after all.”

            “I’m not looking for information from you,” Snape said harshly.  “I’m not a spy.”  Not on her, anyway.

            “I am,” she whispered.  Again, Snape stopped dead.  This time, at least, he had the cover of reaching their destination.  “I’m a spy for the Order of the Pheonix,” she continued, “but no one knows except you and Remus and Gus.  Lily and James and Sirius and Peter stopped trusting us.  We built our whole lives around…we watched them stop trusting us…turn away from us…so that I could go into the heart of darkness.”

            “Why are you telling me this?”  he demanded.

            “So that you know what I gave up for you,” she said, her head still bowed.  Snape didn’t know if he could handle seeing her face.  “I’ve done all of this, deformed my life and all of my friends’ lives, so that I would have the chance to save you.”

            “Save me?” he hissed at her, unable to think.  He could only dumbly repeat her unfathomable words.

            “From _him_ ,” she replied.  “I wanted to save you from the darkness.”

            “You really are stupid,” was all that he could reply.

            “So are you,” she replied, “coming after me like this.  What happened to your self-preservation instincts?  I’ll be dead soon anyway.”

            Snape looked at his watch to avoid thinking about her last sentence.  11:36.  Only one minute until Lupin would take her away, hopefully far away from England where she would be relatively safe.  And soon, like she said, she would die.  He would probably never see her again.

            “What the hell,” he cried almost aloud, “I’ll ask.  Do you – did you ever love me?  Even for the shortest moment, did you ever…”

            “Oh Severus,” she whispered, “there’s that word again.  Does anyone even know what love is when they’re sixteen?”

 

            _In your eyes, I wanted to see love.  I wanted you to look me in the eyes and wish that we hadn’t broken.  That would be enough for me for the rest of my life.  But it wasn’t there, and I had to give you back to my enemy._

 

            The wall opened, and Remus Lupin stood on the other side.  He quickly moved forward, and Severus instantly transferred her to her husband’s arms.  Marissa finally, at long last, exerted the effort to look up at the face of the man carrying her.  She smiled tiredly, then let her head slump back down again, trusting Remus Lupin absolutely.  In the middle of the Malfoy Manor, from whose prison she had just been rescued, she had not the slightest doubt that her pathetic husband would carry her to safety.

            Lupin looked at him, trying to convey with a look all of the confused emotions that he must be feeling.  Well, Snape had enough confusion for a lifetime and certainly no time to deal with Lupin’s.  He closed the portal to the wall and hurried to the end of the corridor before Goyle would come around the turn.

            As he did, he thought the words that he would never have said to her.  Maybe, Fran, no one did know what love was when they were sixteen.  But Severus Snape knew what love was now.  Love was breaking into Malfoy Manor.  Love was walking into her husband’s house if it meant being able to save her.  Love was risking everything and turning on everything he believed in because it would spare her pain.

            Love was bending her entire life into a pretzel to give herself the chance to save him.  Love was disregarding her husband, her friends and even her own best interests.  Love was watching her friendships, her very family, break because it would give her the chance to help him.

            So, in the end, it didn’t matter if she had chosen Potter or Lupin.  It didn’t matter if she had always loved a werewolf or even if she had married the very monster who had tried to kill him.  Because she did love him.

 

_In your eyes, I am still worth saving._

 

            Beatrice and Dante were parted when they were very young.  After losing the woman that he had loved and worshipped almost to the point of idolatry, his life turned down a dark road.  But years later, Beatrice reached through the barriers of life and death, through heaven and Purgatory and hell.  She went into the depths of hell to find a means of saving him.  And she led him back to the light that he had almost forgotten.  From there, though it was not always certain what he chose, he at least knew that there was a place for him among the light.


	5. Marissa: The Reason I Chose You

**Chapter Four**

**The Reason I Chose You**

_In your eyes, I am an angel._

            David Potter was as happy as a clam when he went to pick up his son James from Platform Nine and Three Quarters for his Christmas break for the first time.  Anyone watching could easily see that.  Cindy Potter was positively glowing.  They had the cart all ready to take his suitcase and were waiting excitedly for their son to bound down the steps to the train.  Looking out the window, the six first years peering out at them could easily see that James’s family was by far the most ecstatic to have him back.

            “Your mum looks ready to get back to the urgent task of fattening you up,” Sirius had commented, rolling his eyes despite the jealous twinge in his voice.

            However, it was clear that Cindy Potter was not ready for the girl who hopped down off the train just ahead of her son.  She had been prepared to leap forward, highly embarrassing James in the process.  Instead she froze and grabbed her husband’s arm, staring at the little blonde girl who she would swear was a ghost come back to haunt her, except for the fact that she was exchanging goodbyes with her son and his friends.

            “Um, James?” Marissa said after an awkward moment, “is your mum staring at me?”

            Marissa tried not to look too concerned as James turned around to look at his parents.  “Nah,” he said, not sounding entirely convinced.  “She’s just looking at me.”  But when James sauntered proudly over to his parents, Cindy Potter’s eyes remained fixed on Marissa Fletcher.  Following her gaze, David Potter looked over and immediately anchored his gaze on the girl as well.

            They still had not looked away when a small boy with light brown hair came pelting up to Marissa and threw his arms around her.  She laughed and gave him a big hug, lifting him up just enough that his feet left the ground.  Cindy Potter almost involuntarily started forward the instant that she heard the laugh.  She strode purposefully toward the two who were eagerly trying to catch up on everything that had happened in the past few months in a few seconds.  Then Cindy saw the grumpy man who was coming over to hurry them along, and she stopped again.

            “You!” she cried aloud, attracting the man’s attention along with half the crowd on the Platform.  “She married you?” Cindy Potter demanded, sounding incredulous.  “That’s why she hasn’t spoken to us?  That’s why she cut ties?  To marry _you?_ ”

            David Potter was instantly at his wife’s side, but he looked no less flabbergasted and upset.  “Why didn’t she seek us out when your daughter entered Hogwarts?” he asked, sounding terribly hurt.  “If she was willing to re-enter the wizarding world, why did she keep herself away from us?  Where is she now?”

            “My mother’s dead,” Marissa Fletcher said quietly.  

            Jerome Fletcher could only glare daggers at the couple.  “I don’t know what you are talking about.  We have never had any of this unnatural nonsense in the family before,” he said coldly.  “Come along, Marissa, Mundungus.”

            “Livy died?” Cindy Potter gasped.  “Please, was your mother Olivia Newton?” she asked, turning to Marissa. Her husband instantly put his arms around her.

            “In childbirth with the youngest,” Jerome Fletcher said briskly, moving forward to block his daughter.  “I don’t know who you are to bring up such things,” he continued, obviously furious, “but I must insist that you stop talking about my wife as if you knew her.”

            “Livy was my sister!” Cindy shouted at him in fury.  “You had no right not to tell us that she had died!  You had no right to hide my niece and nephew from me!  How many are there?”

            “Only two,” he said coldly, “and you can claim relation to neither of them.”

            “Look at her!  She’s the spitting image of Livy!”

            “Remember dear,” David said, pulling her closer, “how very good Livy was with Memory Charms.”

            “You think she…” Cindy shuddered and covered her face, unable to repress the tears for the sister with whom she had once been so close.  To lose her once was bad enough.   This second loss, from which there could be no hope of recovery, was shattering.  “How could she forget us?  How could she not trust us to see what she saw in him eventually?  Why did she have to turn away from us?”

            Although the confusing conversation was eventually sorted out and Marissa and Mundungus (if not their father) were welcomed into the Potter family, Marissa Fletcher would never forget the agonized look on Cindy Potter’s face or her words.  She would wonder through the years how her mother could ever have turned from her family, especially when with each new story that she learned of her she found that they had once been so close.  The Newton girls had once been as inseparable as the Gryffindor Six.

 

~*~*~

 

            The answer to Marissa’s question was time.

            Time and circumstance had corroded the trust of friends the way that the cancer corroded Marissa Lupin’s once strong body.  Time was against both participants in the race, but distrust was beating disease.  The most fervent prayer of Marissa Lupin’s life was that the disease would outrun the disbelief.  It was denied.  The friendship that had sustained her life in the first trial would die before her body.  Doubt had beaten death to the finish line.

            Not by much.  Just enough.  Fate was cruel that way.  The final signs of a fatally broken friendship had manifested themselves only a few hours before the darkness threatened to overwhelm her.  Lily and James were lost forever, in danger because they thought that she was their betrayer.

            So it was with a crippling sense of despair that Marissa curled her body into the fetal position in a vain attempt to ease the wracking pain and waited for death to finish her.  She gave an involuntary cry of pain and fear when she heard a loud crack of someone entering her cell.

            “Mrs. Lupin, are you all right, missus?” the anxious, high-pitched voice greeted her ears.

            Her lips twisted into a smile that could not smooth the pain-filled furrows in her brows.  “I don’t want you to have to iron your hands, Dobby,” she said quietly, surprised at how hoarse her voice sounded and how much it drained her to whisper.

            “I would come even if I did, Marissa Lupin, missus.” Dobby nodded fervently.  Marissa didn’t have to open her eyes in order to know what he was doing.  “May I get you something, missus?”

            “I don’t want you to have to hurt yourself, Dobby,” Marissa said as firmly as she could manage, barely able to get out the words.

            “I would do it for you, missus,” he said earnestly.

            Marissa took a deep breath then let it out slowly.  After a moment, she opened her eyes and saw that Dobby had pressed his face so close to her own that their noses were almost touching.  “There is something that you can do for me, Dobby.”

            “I will do anything you help Marissa Lupin,” Dobby declared proudly.  “Marissa Lupin has always been kind to Dobby.  Marissa Lupin always came to see Dobby.   Marissa Lupin is the only witch who has ever been on Dobby’s side.”

            “I hope that I will not be the last,” Marissa whispered.  “Dobby, when I’m gone, I need you to look after the book.”  Dobby shivered and started to inch away.  “Don’t you hurt yourself!” Marissa cried more forcefully than she had thought she could manage.  It took a moment to recover her strength.  “I don’t mean hide it or steal it.  I know that you can’t, Dobby.  But if Lucius ever decides to give the book to someone else, I need you to tell someone.  Dumbledore if you can.  If not, you need to warn the Potters.  If…if that book ever leaves this house…terrible things will happen.  Probably at Hogwarts.”

            It took several deep breaths before Marissa could speak again.  “Can you do that for me, Dobby?  You’ll probably have to punish yourself after you tell, but please, you must promise me that you will.  I need you to protect the Potters when I can’t.  I need you to keep an eye on that book.”

            “Dobby will, Marissa Lupin.  I promise you, Dobby will.”

            “Thank you, Dobby,” Marissa said, collapsing against the hard, dirty floor of the dungeon.

            “Is there anything else that Dobby can do for Marissa Lupin?”

            “Sing me your lullaby, Dobby,” Marissa whispered, “Help me fall asleep - help me sleep until the end.”

            There is no song more soothing than the lullaby of House Elves.  The pain did not fade away, but Marissa Lupin did cross the boundary into the world of sleep and escape its ravages.  She waited there for the journey to the Other Side.  “Remember your promise, Dobby,” she whispered just before she lost consciousness.

 

~*~*~

 

            The clean white sheets enveloped her and a soft white light peaked through the curtains.  They were not curtains or sheets that she recognized.

            “Remus?” she called softly, knowing that he would not be far.

            Indeed, a dark mass moved slightly just beyond the edge of the bed.  “I’m here,” he told her quietly and sincerely.  She had already known that.  Remus would always be there.  As long as she lived, Remus Lupin would always be there trying to protect her, trying to save her, and above all worrying himself to death in the process.

            “Would you open the curtains?” she asked, stretching.  She was surprised at both how much effort it took and how long she must have been in the same position.  Her husband obediently rose and drew the curtains back to let in more white light.  “Thank you.”

            “You don’t have to talk, just rest,” he told her.

            Marissa smiled as she finished stretching and sat up slowly.  “I’m not going to be running a marathon anytime soon, but I don’t need to sleep to recover from thirty seconds of consciousness,” she cut off his protest.

            “You always try to push it,” Remus told her worriedly.  Always worrying, that one.

            Marissa smiled in amusement, “On the contrary, I always know precisely what I can and cannot do.”  Marissa hoped that they were not in for another Staircase Battle over whether or not she could even sit up in bed.

 

~*~*~

 

            “Darling,” he called playfully up the stairs, “Could you help me get my coat off?  I have such trouble with these Muggle buttons.”

            Not fooled for a moment by his casual tone, Marissa Lupin dropped the books that she had been working on.  Just the sound of his voice was enough to flood relief and joy through her entire body.  Energy that had been deserting her only a few seconds ago now suffused her so that she didn’t just run toward the sound of her husband’s voice.  Instead, she bolted out of the room and came sliding across the landing at the top of the stairs.

            When she saw him, leaning on the banister with a playful and not perfectly executed posture of utter calm, she had no choice but to hurtle down the stairs into his arms.  “Remus!” she cried excitedly as she threw herself into her husband’s arms, and he laughingly received her, looking proud of the reaction he had produced from her.  She immediately kissed him, repeatedly.

            This was, unfortunately, no typical newlywed interaction.  Although Marissa Lupin would have been utterly delighted by her husband’s return under any circumstances, he was actually returning a full day early from a somewhat long and, though neither said it aloud, highly dangerous secret mission for the Order.  Relief from the constant worry and joy to know that he had returned to her safely multiplied her reactions.  She suspected his as well.

            “Riss,” he said almost sternly after a moment of simply kissing her back, “we’ve talked about the stairs.”

            “And I haven’t violated my promise,” she replied, kissing him again before she explained, “I said I wouldn’t run up the stairs.”

            “Riss,” he said sternly.

            “Remus, as long as we still have sex, I don’t see how you can justify not letting me go up stairs, much less down them.”  And yes, that only sounded like a casual comment.  “But you can carry me up the stairs if you want dinner tonight.”

            “That doesn’t follow, dear,” he told her, even as he swung her up into his arms and started to carry her up the long flight of stairs.

            “Yes, it does,” she replied.  “I could either go up the stairs myself or cook you dinner tonight,” she was likely to win any argument at this point, she knew, because she had started kissing him along his neck.  However ridiculous her points, she knew that Remus was about to turn into goop in her hands.

            “You equate cooking dinner with going up the stairs?  And you admit that you probably shouldn’t wear yourself out by doing both?” he managed to point out.

            “No, I admit that I shouldn’t do three somewhat strenuous activities in a row,” she replied as suggestively as Sirius could have done in a similar situation.  “By the way, you really need to apologize before we get into any of it.”

            “Why is that?” Remus asked, already sounding apologetic and offering no further argument as he might have had she not moved to his ear.

            She stopped and pulled away to look at him seriously, “Always give me the real estimate of when you are going to return from a mission.”

            “I don’t want you to worry if I’m late,” Remus defended himself, stopping as they reached the top of the stairs.

            “The only way that I won’t worry from the very first moment that you could possibly return is if I believe that you shouldn’t be back any sooner than you claim,” she told him, “and I really think that Dumbledore will start to get annoyed with me if I have to check your story with him every time.”

            “You…” Remus stared at her, “talked to Dumbledore?”

            “What can I say?  I’m crazy about you, love,” she gave him a small smile.  Remus leaned in and kissed her deeply for a long moment.

            When they pulled away, he promised, “I will from now on.”  Then he started toward the bedroom again.

            “Good,” she said, resuming her harassment of his ear.  “By the way, you’re cooking dinner tonight.”

 

~*~*~

 

            “It’s good to know that you’re all right,” she told him, drinking in the sight of him whole, without any wound, for a long moment.

            “You’re the one who was just captured,” he told her, and she could hear the strain in his voice that the memory caused.  She reached out her hand, and he immediately took it, coming to sit on the bed beside her.  He drew her close very gently and held her in his arms for a long time.  She rested against him, breathing deeply of the musty smell of Remus Lupin.

            It was a moment out of time and neither of them knew how long it lasted.  After awhile, however, time decided to interrupt.  It could never let these two alone.  This time, it attacked in the form of an annoying beeping coming from the bedside table.  Laughing and groaning at once, Marissa pulled away, “Time’s up.”  She settled back against the pillow that Remus hastily propped up behind her.  “What was that for?  Medicine or food?”

            “Both,” Remus replied.

            “Ah, the medicine I have to take with food, my favorite,” Marissa replied somewhat drolly.  “I shudder to think what would have become of me if you had been the one captured.  I’d be sitting pretty in bed trying to will my pills to me as I went mad with worry.  Not to mention being frustrated to the point of insanity that I couldn’t go and rescue you.”

            Remus, who had been bustling about getting the right medicines, stopped and sat down next to her again.  “I would have been in the same position if it weren’t for Severus Snape.”

            “Severus Snape?” Marissa asked mildly.  “Not Snivellus or Snasty or any other of the terribly clever names you boys had for him?  Not even just plain Snape said with a vaguely disapproving air?”

            “He’s the one who saved you, Riss,” Remus said, “I was powerless even to find you.”

            Again Marissa took his hand and squeezed it.  “You would have found a way,” she said quietly.

            “I’m not so sure, Riss,” he replied, sounding more broken than she had ever heard him sound before.

            “I am,” she told him.

            He waited a moment, with his head bowed, not daring to look at her.  Then he seemed to snap back to attention.  “Well, I guess I’d better get your food now,” he said.  “There’s a glass of water on the nightstand next to the pills.  I’ll be right back.”

            “I’ve got it, Remus,” a different male voice said, just as a young man with dirt brown hair came in through the door to the bedroom carrying a tray of food.

            Marissa whirled on her husband, “You pulled Gus out of Hogwarts?” she demanded, staring at him angrily.  “Why would you do that?  He has to finish school!”

            Once he had set down the tray, her brother took up an almost eerily similar stubborn stance, facing his sister with his arms folded over his chest.  “I’ve got my O.W.L.s, Riss.  Hogwarts is superfluous at this point, or at least it’s a secondary concern,” he told her firmly.

            His sister was hearing nothing of it, “You are getting your N.E.W.T.s, and school is your primary concern until you are out of Hogwarts!”

            “ _You_ are more important than some silly test scores!” he cried.

            “I told you I would be here for your Christmas break!  And your education is the most important thing until you graduate!” she shouted back at him.

            “You can’t guarantee that, and besides, I don’t just want two more weeks with you!” Gus yelled right back at her.  “Besides, I’m in seventh year and –“

            “You are still sixteen and I am still your legal guardian!” Marissa said firmly, emphasizing her point by slamming her hand down on the bed.  “And I say that you will finish Hogwarts.  There will be no discussion.”

            “Riss,” her husband interjected into the spat between brother and sister, “we worked it out with Professor Dumbledore.  This isn’t like when you tried to quit school.  He’ll go three days a weeks and study the subjects on his own to keep up with the work.  The other four he will spend here with us.”

            Marissa tried to calm herself down.  She knew that depriving Gus of this time with her would be cruel and stupid.  She just hadn’t been able to control her reaction to the similarity between his desertion of Hogwarts and her own attempt to drop out in fifth year.

 

~*~*~

            

            “ Miss Fletcher, we have much to discuss for so early in the school year,” Professor McGonagall said in a deceptively calm tone of voice as she sat across the desk from Marissa Fletcher in her office.  This was a not altogether uncommon occurrence.  In her days at Hogwarts, Marissa, both with and without the Marauders, had caused her fair share of mischief.  McGonagall’s office was like a second home to all the members of the Gryffindor Six, and they were considerably more comfortable in it than any prefect should be.  This, however, was entirely different than their usual conversations.

            This time it was not about Slytherins dyed bright red or third years who couldn’t stop singing Beatles songs.  It wasn’t even like the talk they had had on the first day of classes four years ago when Gus had snuck on board the Hogwarts Express of his own volition.  Gus was no longer a six-year-old who couldn’t be held accountable for his actions.  She was no longer an innocent, surprised sister who had found him and not tried to hide him from the school officials.

            “I have heard the report of Madam Pomfrey and seen the boy with my own eyes,” Professor McGonagall continued, her lips easily the thinnest that Marissa had ever seen.  “But I still have to hear it from you.  I need to hear from the girl that I made a prefect for Gryffindor not more than two months ago that she not only flouted fifty of the most sacred school rules but violated both wizarding and Muggle law!”

            “Professor McGonagall, I –“

            “I don’t want to hear a word of excuses!” she cut her off, rising to her feet to better use her menacing height.  “What were you thinking?  A model student for four years – minus a few minor pranks – but I never dreamed that you would do anything this stupidly irresponsible!  This ridiculously empty-headed-“

            “That will be quite enough, Minerva,” the Headmaster said as he swept into her office.  “Miss Fletcher, I believe that you had better come with me.”  Marissa rose miserably and followed him.

            “Headmaster, is Gus-“

            “He will survive the incident without even a scar,” Professor Dumbledore replied with almost no expression in his voice.  He did not turn to look at her.  She had never seen him so detached.  “It was a mild burn, but it is still good that you brought him to Madam Pomfrey.”

            “I was trying to cook,” Marissa said in a soft voice.  “Ginger snaps.  I always try to make my mum’s cookies for him, but I never seem to get them right.  This is by far the worst attempt.  I can’t believe that pan toppled over right onto him…”

            Dumbledore did not respond.  He had not looked at her since they left McGonagall’s office.  His silence on the long walk to his office was far worse than her Head of House’s yelling.  Worst of all, he whispered the password to the Gargoyle, as if she would soon no longer be a prefect with the privilege of knowing it.

            They rode up the winding staircase in silence, but just before they reached the door Dumbledore turned to look at her. This was worse than anything yet, even the thought of Gus going back to _him._ He looked down at her for a long moment until Marissa was sure that he was going to say something. Instead, he just opened the door to his office and waved her inside.

            "Have a seat, Miss Fletcher," Dumbledore said, not unkindly, but more seriously than she had ever heard him before.  He waited a long moment before speaking, during which he turned his penetrating gaze on her over the rim of his half-moon spectacles.  His eyes were definitely not twinkling now.

            At long last, he began, “You brought a very strange patient to Madam Pomfrey yesterday.  Someone who will not be a student at this school for another year.”  Marissa was silent.  She could think of nothing to say.  Dumbledore sighed heavily, “I am disposed to think that this is not simply some idiotic joke.”  Marissa kept her face down, but she could not repress the hope that rose within her.  “I have been trying to impress on your year for four years that you do not have to take matters into your own hands.  Especially when it is something this serious, you can and must look for help outside of the small group of fellows you have collected about you.”

            Dumbledore sighed heavily again.  “Miss Fletcher, why did you feel the need to bring your brother to Hogwarts?”

            “I couldn’t leave Gus with that man,” Marissa said quietly.

            “Has he ever hurt either of you?” he asked, gravely serious.

            Marissa bowed her head again then nodded slightly.  She lifted her hair off the back of her neck and turned around enough that the Headmaster could see the dark but fading bruise she usually hid behind it.  After a moment, she pulled back her sleeves to reveal the smaller, less violent bruises on her arms.  “He’s never touched Gus, and to be fair, I think these were an accident,” Marissa said softly.  “But I can’t let him have another accident on Gus.”

            “An accident?” Professor Dumbledore clarified in a soft voice to match her own.

            “He was drunk,” she replied.  “He isn’t usually, it was their anniversary.  He was having some sort of fight with her, in his mind.  He sounded crazy, and I was worried.  I ran in front of him, trying to calm him down.  He started yelling at me.  He was swinging his arms around and knocked me down the stairs.  Gus started forward to help me, and he started waving around the bottle in his hands.  He could have hurt Gus!”

            “Has this ever happened before?” Professor Dumbledore asked seriously.

            “Once or twice he’s gotten violent, usually with a room full of furniture, on their anniversary or the day that she died or any other special day that the two of them had,” Marissa replied.  “We had one or two close calls before but he’s never injured either of us before.  But…with every time I go off to Hogwarts it gets worse.  He…I’m afraid he’ll go around the bend on Gus next time…”

            “I see,” Dumbledore replied.  “As it was an accident and there have been no further incidents of abuse, I am afraid that you and Gus do not have grounds to apply to Hogwarts as a Haven.”

            “No, please, Headmaster!” Marissa cried out involuntarily, starting forward in her chair.

            “I am afraid the Ministry of Magic would not stand for me shielding your brother from his lawful guardian,” Dumbledore replied.  “I can not deprive a boy of his family.”

            Marissa had nodded briskly.  Then she rose to her feet and looked him firmly in the eye.  “I understand, Professor,” she said in a strong voice quite different from the whispers that she had been using.  Now she met his penetrating gaze with equal strength, her own blue eyes determined and fixed.  “Thank you for all of the kindness that you’ve shown me over the years,” she said sincerely but shortly.  “I doubt we’ll be seeing you once we’ve left the school.”

            “Sit down, Miss Fletcher,” the Headmaster said without anger or much emotion, but very softly and very seriously.  It was a tone of command that few had ever disobeyed when Albus Dumbledore used it.

            “Goodbye, Headmaster,” she said instead, holding out her wand for him to take and snap in half.

            "Sit down, Miss Fletcher," he repeated, and this time his voice held a hint of anger. Marissa, seeing that he was not going to take her wand, dropped it onto his desk and walked to the door. The moment she put her hand on the knob, however, she leapt back with a cry of surprise and pain. The next moment her wand rose off the desk and hovered near her chair as if waiting. Marissa looked back at Dumbledore who was regarding her calmly. Apparently, wandless magic did not require great emotion from him. Or perhaps he was very angry indeed about her decision but as inscrutable as ever. "Have a seat, Miss Fletcher." 

             For almost a full minute, they stared each other down, Marissa all but glaring at him and Dumbledore looking back calmly. Then Marissa walked slowly back to the chair in front of his desk and threw herself down into it. She looked at the wand for a very long moment, and then looked at Dumbledore without taking it. It remained there in midair, both student and Headmaster apparently determined to ignore it for the present. "You can't stop me from leaving Hogwarts, Professor Dumbledore.”

            "Perhaps not, but I can prevent you from taking a minor child with you. In fact, as a minor yourself you have no claim to Mundungus or emancipation from your father at all, particularly if you are unwilling to declare your father’s abuse intentional. I'm afraid, Miss Fletcher, that if you leave Hogwarts, you will leave it alone.”

            Marissa stared at Dumbledore for the first time in real anger. Dumbledore calmly met her eyes. "I won't leave Gus to that man," she said through clenched teeth.  “I won’t wait to act until he’s already been hurt.”

            "It is very lucky, Miss Fletcher, that you are still a student of my school, for I am afraid that you have much to learn," Dumbledore said with infuriating calm.  “Specifically, what I have been trying to impress on you and your friends for years: you don’t have to do everything yourselves.”

            “You just said that you can’t help me,” Marissa replied, looking near tears in her frustration.  “And now you won’t let me help him on my own?”

            “You are fifteen years old, Miss Fletcher,” Dumbledore told her seriously.  “You are too young to carry the load of even your own life by yourself.  Taking care of another life is beyond you.”

            “My brother and I don’t have anyone besides each other, Headmaster,” Marissa said coldly.  “Even before my father turned violent, he wasn’t there.  And now you want me to walk away from him too?”  She cast a quick glance at the wand still hovering in the air and then back to the Headmaster, “I’m a witch, the first Fletcher to be a witch.  I thought I’d break the family tradition.  Between myself and my brother, I choose Gus.”

            “You are the first witch born into the Fletcher family,” Dumbledore conceded, “but you are not, in fact, the only member of your family with magical ability.”  He pulled a file from amidst a stack of scrolls on his desk.  “I asked your brother’s school for his records.  It seems that he tests as exceptionally bright but hasn’t been applying himself in class.  He is also put down as a trouble maker, much like his older sister.  There are an extraordinary number of bizarre incidents surrounding him as well, even for a young wizard this is an unusually large display of involuntary magic.  I have discussed it with Professor Slughorn, the Deputy Headmaster, who conducted an interview with him and the Headmistress of his school.  We all feel that he would be an excellent candidate for early admission to Hogwarts.”

            Marissa’s mouth dropped open, and she found herself speechless for a long moment. “Professor?” she managed to stammer, feeling tears come to her eyes, “I…”

            “You don’t have to do everything on your own, Miss Fletcher,” he told her.  “Perhaps we’ve come a little closer to understanding each other today.”

            “Thank you,” she gasped, wanting to go over and hug Dumbledore but having no idea how he would respond.

            “Take your wand out of the air, Miss Fletcher,” he told her, “before I change my mind and expel you for this foolish stunt.”

            Marissa could not speak.  She simply stood and picked up her wand again.  It felt wonderful between her fingers.  She turned to leave again.  “If you were wondering about the summer holidays,” Dumbledore stopped her again just before she left, “I’m sure the Potters would be delighted to take their niece and nephew in for the majority of it.  If not, you can certainly stay with them on weeks that you feel he might be dangerous.”

            Marissa nodded and turned to leave again.  She grabbed the knob and started to turn it when Dumbledore stopped her again.  “The day that you turn seventeen, I want to see you in my office.  I will put today’s memory in a Pensieve, and we will go to the Ministry together to have you made your brother’s legal guardian.”  She turned her head to give him one more incredulous gaze.  “Neither or us wants your brother in a Muggle orphanage, Miss Fletcher.  And though seventeen is not so very much older than fifteen, it is at least when the rest of the wizards and witches your age will face adulthood.”

            “I’ll be here, Headmaster,” she said quietly.  “Where is my brother?”

            “He is on his way here.  You may stay to watch his Sorting Ceremony if you would like,” he told her.  She walked back and sat down and spent the rest of the few minutes before her ecstatic brother arrived staring at Albus Dumbledore as if she had never seen him before.  “Are you aware of the exact amount of your inheritance from your mother upon reaching the age of seventeen?”

            “I wasn’t aware of its existence,” Marissa replied.

            “It should be enough to set you up in a moderate house and to put your brother through the rest of his school years,” Dumbledore told her.  “If I know Olivia Newton, which I like to think that I did though it was many years ago, there will be a Gringott’s key in the safe deposit box in your name which will open a vault containing a considerably larger sum.  It’s a pity we will have to wait two years to see if I miss my guess.”

            “Would she be proud of me, Professor?”

            Dumbledore looked up at her again with is penetrating gaze.  “What is it that your friend Mr. Black often says in response to questions?  I believe it is, ‘do hippos secretly want to dance with sugar plum fairies’? Is that correct?”

            “Yes, sir,” Marissa said, a smile tugging at her lips.

            “Well, I have been puzzling over this question for some time, and I find that it is a question that defies all positive knowledge,” he told her.  “But your friend seems to have an instinctive grasp of the answer.  Sometimes, those are the most accurate kind.”

 

~*~*~

 

            Marissa smiled slightly, sitting back calmly.  “I see Dumbledore has stepped in to help our family again,” she remarked.

            “And correct your impassioned but misguided solution to the situation,” Gus put in.  “Don’t forget that part.”

            Marissa smiled widely at him.  “Come here you stupid Hufflepuff,” she told her brother.  He came over and kissed her on the forehead.

            “Nice to see you, you foolhardy Gryffindor,” he told her.  She gave his hand a quick squeeze.

            “You’ve grown up really well, Gus,” she told him, running an appraising eye over her handsome younger brother.  His scruffy dirty brown hair was well-trimmed to give him the same kind of wholesome, boy-next-door appeal as James, to whom he had been a little brother.  His crystal blue eyes matched his sister’s in color, shape and mischievous glint.

            “Ew!  Incest!” Gus cried, “Oepidus complex!”

            “Antigone complex, please,” Marissa corrected.  “If you’re going to be vulgar, at least be accurate.”

            “I was being accurate,” he replied.  “You just played your ‘legal guardian’ card.  Don’t try and weasel out of your maternal role here now.”

            “Remus, remove this scoundrel from my presence!” Marissa laughed, waving her brother away.  “How can you let this young upstart talk that way to your wife?”

            “If there’s one thing that I’ve learned in the course of our marriage,” Remus Lupin replied, bringing the tray over to her bed and setting it down in front of her, “it is not to interfere in your sibling spats.  So, if you will please take your pills, drink your tea, and have some lunch, we can all at least know we’ve done our part.”

            Both of her boys sat down on opposite edges of her bed.  For a twenty-one year old woman, it was not a bad showing, all told.  Two men who loved her this much, to take care of her when she was sick.  Two lives that she had touched so profoundly.  It wasn’t a bad showing at all.

            She once had six, but they all knew that that was over now.  She just wished that she had had a chance to say goodbye.

 

~*~*~

 

             Marissa looked around the small circle that she had gathered around her.  This was her family, not just the little brother who sat directly to her right.  The pretty redheaded girl with whom she had shared a room for just over six years was a sister; if not for everything else then because now she looked like her perpetual strength had fled her.  The boy with messy hair who was gripping the girl’s shoulders very tightly was Marissa’s brother because of more than the blood connection they had uncovered years ago; he was her brother because he looked like a ship ripped from its moorings.  The boy sitting next to him was family not because they had both been taken in by the Potters but because he was speechless for perhaps the first time in his life.  The boy next to him would always be a brother to her because he had never looked smaller or more uncertain, which was saying something with Peter Pettigrew.  The boy sitting next to her on the opposite side from her brother was precious not just because of the years of friendship that stood between them, but because of the tortured look in his eyes as he fastened them on her.

            She had just told them the bare bones of what the doctors had told her.  Uncle David and Aunt Cindy had offered to be with her when she told them, but Marissa had wanted to tell them at Hogwarts.  This was her unorthodox family’s home.  The long “Gryffindor” table down in the Kitchens was the supper table in the tableau.  This was the right place to break the news to them.

            Years later, she would look back at the arrangement and wonder if it was a prophecy of things to come.  She, Remus and Gus had sat on one side of the table with Lily, James, Sirius and Peter on the other.  But it was hard to imagine that the split could possibly have gone back that far.  Not when Sirius had burst out, sounding as if he were on the verge of swallowing his tongue, “But what are you going to…I mean, do they think you could – are you going to…”

            “The doctors say that we have every reason to be optimistic,” she told them, catching and holding her brother’s hand, using her other to rub his back gently.  “I’ll be starting treatments shortly.”

            A house elf bobbed up and thrust an exceedingly large platter of ginger snaps onto the table and watched the teenagers eagerly to see if they would enjoy them.

            “What kind of treatments?” Sirius demanded, for perhaps the first time in his life completely ignoring the appearance of cookies.  “And why not Healers?”

            “It’s a Muggle disease,” Marissa said, “the Healers Professor Dumbledore and I went to see didn’t know whether to scratch their heads or their behinds.”  Gus smiled weakly, and Marissa smiled back to encourage it.  Lily offered a very small chuckle but snuggled closer to James as if on instinct.  “I’ll be going to a Muggle hospital for about a month.  When I come back, Madam Pomfrey will help me day to day.  On Saturdays I’ll go back to the hospital for more treatments.”

            “What kind of treatments are they going to do?” Sirius demanded forcefully, trying, as ever, to hide his suffering under aggression.

            “Treatments that will remove the tumor,” Marissa replied, hoping that he would leave it at that.  She really didn’t want to get into the details of what surgery was with these boys.  Even Lily would probably find a definition of it distasteful at the moment.

            “How?” Sirius demanded, never one to be silent when it was prudent.

            Marissa paused, dreading the pureblooded reaction to her description, “They are going to cut open my head, cut the tumor out, and sew me back up.”

            “Like hell they are!” he shouted, rising to his feet and standing over her.

            “Sit down, Sirius!  Muggles do it all the time!” Marissa said sharply, wanting to kill him for the way that Gus had shuddered at her description.  “What would you have me do?  Leave it growing in my brain?”  That probably wasn’t the wisest choice of phrases either, but she was understandably upset and she didn’t need Sirius making things harder on everyone.

            “Then Muggles are daft!  Have a Healer vanish it!”

            “And half my temporal lobe with it?” Marissa enquired drolly.  “No, surgery is a perfectly normal occurrence.  Everything will be fine.  Calm down.”

            “She’s right, surgery itself isn’t that uncommon,” Lily said quietly, looking up and meeting Marissa’s eyes warily.  Sirius sat down.  “But Riss…cancer…it’s bad.”

            “But beatable,” Marissa said firmly.  “This is just something that we have to deal with for awhile.  We have every reason to think that I’ll be okay.  And this will just be another chapter in our lives.  Probably not the best chapter, but it doesn’t have to be the worst either.”

 

~*~*~

 

            Marissa regretted her hasty words of years ago.  Shouldn’t she of all people know better than to tempt the gods?  No, her seventh year had not been the worst chapter of her life.  In fact, it was one of the last ones where she didn’t have to fight for the love of the people that she cared about the most.  That almost made it one of the good chapters.  After all, when else in her life had she had such firm proof from every quarter that she had the love and devotion of those to whom she gave love and devotion in greatest measure?

            Now, prognosis fatal and her support base seriously reduced, Marissa wondered if this was not the worst of times she had spoken of so flippantly years ago.

            This brought her mind to what she had noticed when she first woke up.  It was easy to tell from every object around her that she was not in the house she and Remus had lived in, with Gus on holidays, for three years.  “Where are we?” she asked as she took a halting bite of the slightly runny omelet on her plate.  She forced herself to choke it down, knowing that if she didn’t, the medicine would punish her much more than the food.  When pill bottles read, “Take with food,” they meant it.  Like most things regarding her disease, Remus and Marissa had learned that the hard way.

            The boys exchanged glances which Marissa would not have missed at her most naïve.  “If you want, you could eat the ginger snaps that I made first,” Gus told her, deliberately not answering her question.  “I promise I won’t tell on you for spoiling your lunch.”   Marissa felt like sighing.  These boys knew her too well.

            She picked up one of the warm, soft cookies and took a tentative bite.  She could never resist her mother’s cookie recipe, however inexpertly prepared by herself or her brother.  “It’s delicious, Gus, now where are we?”

            Deciding to answer her question partially, Remus strode to the window and looked out, “Isn’t that a gorgeous view?  You always said you wanted to grow old in a place with a view of the sea.”

            “Which sea?” Marissa demanded, taking a sip of water in the hopes that it would be easier to force down than the solid food.

            “The place the Fletcher family always used to go to on holiday, the one grandma left us in her will,” Gus answered carefully, bracing himself for another explosion.

            “That’s in Hawaii!” she burst out in pure surprise.

            “Yes, and it’s even more beautiful than he said, Riss,” Gus said quickly, rising to stand next to Remus and looking at him with a plea for help.  “You remember the way that he used to talk about this place?  He and mum came here for their honeymoon, so I almost didn’t believe that they saw much of it but –“

            “Merlin!” Remus cried in protest.  “I realize you’re going through your vulgar innuendo teenager stage, but your own mother?  I thought I was immune to anything growing up in the same room as Sirius!”

            There was an uncomfortable pause at the mention of Sirius.  “Riss, would you like a milkshake instead?” Gus asked her, while locking eyes with Remus.  There was a brief silent conversation between them.  Good.  They stood a better chance of convincing her if they teamed up.  Not that they would ever beat her.  But if they split up, it would definitely be easier.

            After Gus made a hasty exit, Remus stood looking out the window for an awkward moment before he came and sat on the bed next to her.  “It really is beautiful out here,” he offered.

            “I’m sure it is,” she replied, looking him squarely in the eyes, not even glancing out the window.  “I want to go home.”

            Remus broke the gaze and gestured around the room, “And this house, you really can’t believe it.  It’s this beautiful, amazing place.  It’s just your taste in furniture and beyond comfortable and…beautiful.”

            “I’m sure it is,” Marissa said again.  “I want to go home.”

            “Riss,” Remus said, taking her face in his hands as lightly as he could when he wanted to crush her to him, “you were just captured.  Lucius Malfoy held you captive for two days!  Do you not understand how dangerous it is for you back home?”

            “We can’t hide, Remus, it’s not in us to,” Marissa told him, covering one of his hands with her own.  “We decided that when I relapsed.  We knew then that we could never run, never hide from this war.  It’s not in us to leave.”

            “Damn it!” Remus cried aloud, throwing up his hands and pulling back.  “Riss, they just took you away from me!  I can’t – I can’t let them – don’t ask me to go back where they’ll take you from me!”

             Marissa reached forward and gently ran her hand along his cheek, calming him.  She turned his chin so that he had to look her in the eyes.  “There is nothing that has that power,” she told him seriously, holding his cheek in her hand.

            “Riss,” he murmured.

            “You hear me?” she asked more firmly.  “There is nothing that can take me away from you.  Not if you hold me here.”

            Remus looked down, as if to hide the tears in his eyes from her.  “Riss, we could have lost you, we could have lost the time that we have left,” he said seriously.

            “Remus,” she started.

            “No,” he said firmly, looking up at her.  “What are you going back for?  Tell me.”

            “You know,” she told him seriously, not letting go of her hold on him.

            “Riss, where are Lily and James?” he asked pointedly.  Marissa looked down, and Remus pounced.  “Yes, they didn’t tell us.  They don’t _trust_ us anymore, Riss!  They won’t see us even if we go back.  They think we _betrayed_ them.  Us.  Why do you have to go back to see _them?_ ”

            “Because it’s not ‘them,’ Remus,” she replied seriously.  “It’ll never be ‘them’ with Lily and James and Sirius and Peter.  There’s only us.”

            “They broke us,” Remus told her.   “They broke it.  They lifted it over their heads, and they smashed it into the ground.”

            “We still have to go  back,” she told him.

            “Why?” he demanded.  “Why?  After that, why?”

            “Because you’ll need them when I go,” Marissa told him, “and I need to say goodbye before I do.  Not to mention the fact that we’re the only ones who know that they’re still in danger.”

            “I’m tired of futility!” Remus cried.  “I’m tired of it!  I can’t save you from this disease, that’s bad enough.  I couldn’t save you from that monster Malfoy, that was almost unbearable.  I can’t save Lily and James from whichever of our closest friends has really betrayed them.  I can’t make them listen to me.  I can’t make them listen to us and trust us again.  I can’t save them any more than I can save you!  Why do we have to go back?  We won’t save anything.  Why?

            “They’re hunting you!  Death Eaters aren’t our shaky allies anymore.  We have been outed.  We’re past our usefulness to the Order and the War effort.  Our friends won’t let us near them.  We can’t protect them.  There is nothing left for us there!  Why do we have to go back where they’re trying to kill us?”

            “I want to die in England!” Marissa shouted over him, cutting him off.  Then she said in a quiet voice full of tears, “Please, take me home before I’m too weak to travel.  I don’t want to die here, where I can’t reach them.  If they decide…if they change their minds before I die, I have to be where they can reach me.  I can’t let go of us.  I can’t let go of my family.  Please, please I want to go home.”  Tears were flowing down Marissa’s face when her husband gently drew her to him and held her in his arms for the second time that morning.  “Please,” she whispered again.

            “What are you worrying about?” Remus whispered back after a long moment.  “You know I can never say no to you.”  They stayed there a moment, Marissa slowly calming back down.  “But I’m not ready for you to die yet, do you understand?” he told her a moment later.  “I’m not ready to lose you.  I can’t.  Not yet.”

            “I’m not ready to leave you,” she replied.  “I love you, Remus Lupin,” she told him, pulling away just enough to look him in the eyes, “you’re what I’ll miss most about this world.  Loving you is the most selfish thing I’ve ever done, but I wouldn’t trade it.”

            “Don’t you dare,” he told her, their foreheads resting together. “I don’t know why you chose me, but nothing in my life has made me happier.”  They kissed, softly and tenderly.  Remus, as always, treating her as if she were made of glass that might shatter at any moment; or worse, like a mist that would fade away the moment that he tried to reach out and grab it.  Marissa held onto him, her anchor in the storm that raged around her and within her.  Always, always she had found her bearings in Remus Lupin.  Their lips met, trying to communicate all the things that words had always been insufficient to hold.  In the end, they too could not express the depth of the connection between this man and woman, but their souls had been one for too long for any lesser communication to matter in the end.  

            After an all too brief moment, Marissa practically collapsed back onto the bed, too exhausted from her minor exertions to keep her head up much longer.  Remus leaned over and kissed her gently on the forehead, “I’ll let you get some rest, darling.”

            She caught his arm as he started to rise.  “Stay with me for a little while,” she told him, giving him a slight pull back down onto the bed beside her.  He did, taking her in his arms and murmuring mostly meaningless words into her ear as he stroked her hair.

            “Do you remember you once told me that you were staring at Gus and me on Platform Nine and Three Quarters our first day of Hogwarts?” Marissa asked after another long moment later.  “I never told you, but I saw you too.  I saw you looking at us, a look of longing for what we had as brother and sister in your eyes.  That’s when I first chose you.  I came up at the right time to help you with your trunk on purpose.  I had already chosen you to be my friend, before I even met you.”

            “And falling in love with me?” Remus asked, “was that at least a happy accident?”

            “I always assumed that that was what you did on purpose,” Marissa said with a sly smile that Remus didn’t see, as her face was against his chest.  But he knew that it was there.  “But then, you were bloody blind and stupid.”

 

~*~*~

 

            It would have been madness to try to go back to the house where they had lived or Remus’s parents’ house, which they still owned.  Instead, the three of them took up residence in the house where Marissa and Mundungus had grown up.  Their father had died a few years ago, leaving the house in his will to his son with a letter apologizing for everything that he had done to both of them, full of all the things that he hadn’t been able to say to his children during his life.

            It was decided that the only way for them to have any sense of security or even stay in a single place – a necessity with Marissa’s rapidly deteriorating condition – was the same charm that banned them from the Potters’ presence.  Gus was their Secret Keeper, as he would either be with them or relatively safe at Hogwarts.  Marissa protested briefly but quickly saw the sense in the plan.  She did propose one amendment.  She asked that two additional people be told of their whereabouts.  The reason that she gave Gus was that he would be at Hogwarts during the full moon which would occur on the night that they returned to England.  Neither he nor Remus would be able to take care of her if there was a problem.  She needed emergency contacts.  They might need one of the other two men to watch over her.  Gus thought it a last desperate attempt to reclaim a friendship and offered no real protest.

            Remus didn’t really trust anyone else to set up the machine that helped her breathe or to lay out the medicines.  He certainly trusted no one else to hook up her IVs.  So as the sun set behind them, he quickly double-checked everything that his wife would need for the night.

            “Remus,” she said when he was finished, “my will is in the top drawer.  I made a few changes from last time.  I just wanted you to know.”

            “Riss, please, do we have to be morbid now?” Remus asked tiredly.  “It’s bad enough that I’m about to transform into a monster and won’t be able to take care of you tonight.”

            “I love you,” she told him, reaching out her hand and pulling him close to kiss him.  This was not the tender, soft kiss they had shared back in Hawaii.  This was more desperate and had less restraint.  It was also shorter, because Remus was conscious of the fast approaching moon.

            “Don’t start saying your goodbyes,” he told her.  “I’ll see you soon.”

            “I know, I just – I have a bad feeling,” she told him, holding him close to her and kissing him again, trying to drink him in to dispel her fear.

            “That’s my department,” he told her with a smile, kissing her again quickly.  “I’m the worrier in this relationship, remember?”

            She nodded, but she kissed him again, holding onto him as much as her waning strength would allow.  “Love, I have to go,” he said, sounding pained but firm.

            “I know, one more,” she said, quickly closing the distance between them one last time.

            “Riss,” he said when they parted.

            “I know, go,” she said, releasing him with a self-conscious laugh at herself.  “I’ll miss you.”

            “Riss,” he stopped at the door, turning around suddenly indecisive, “if you’re having second thoughts about – I mean if you don’t think it’s worth the risk – at the very least you could do this with me here –“

            “I’ll be fine,” she told him seriously.  “And you always would have had to be not here.  Besides, we don’t have time to wait.  It’ll turn out all right.  You need to go.”  She smiled at him reassuringly, “Don’t fall for any wild wolves while you’re out there now.”

            “I love you, too,” he said with a warm smile before he bolted out of the room and down to the garden shed he and Gus had reinforced with spells to keep him inside.  He got inside with just enough time to magically lock it.

            Marissa Lupin sat back when her husband had gone.  She looked around the room in which she had spent the first fifteen years of her life.  It had changed significantly, but only in the past two days during which they had moved from Hawaii (the very day she convinced Remus) and set up all of her medical paraphernalia.  New pictures had been placed on the bedside table that had once held pictures of her mother and primary school friends.

            She ran her eyes over the two portraits of laughing brides and beaming grooms: Lily and James Potter just to the left of Remus and Marissa Lupin.  It was only an inch of space and two silver frames that separated them there.  The two weddings, however, might as well have taken place on different planets.

 

~*~*~

 

            The Lupin wedding was a quiet affair.  The Gryffindor Six were all up on the altar, Lily as Maid of Honor and the three boys as groomsmen.  Gus was Remus’s Best Man.  In the audience, such as it was, were Albus Dumbledore, Professor McGonagall, Lizzie Walker, the Prewett brothers, Marlene McKinnon, the Longbottoms and Remus’s parents.  A few others had been invited, but the new couple had chosen an awkward time on purpose.  They had to invite the Malfoys for their cover, but they didn’t actually want the odious pair at their wedding.  Not that they probably would have deigned to set foot in a Muggle church anyway.

            The Catholic priest stood at the altar, a jolly man who told jokes to lighten the mood and didn’t seem to understand the pallor that seemed to have gripped all of the guests.  None of them commented that Remus assisted Marissa up the aisle, and most wouldn’t have noticed that he was helping to support her if they hadn’t known how recently she had come out of her second surgery.

            It was a beautiful but quietly defiant wedding.  They were defying time, choosing instead to savor this moment and forget the future.  Those watching had considerably more trouble doing this than the couple, who couldn’t stop smiling and barely kept from laughing throughout their vows.  The priest was a little scandalized, but their friends understood.  They just wished that they could fully share in the new Mr. and Mrs. Lupin’s exuberance.

            An elegant dinner party followed in place of a reception, with good food, lots of laughter, and plenty of memories from their charmed life in school.  The pallor never fully left the guests, however.  They could not pretend as easily as the bride that she hadn’t recently relapsed in her battle with cancer.

 

~*~*~

 

            The Potter wedding, in direct contrast, was extravagant and arrogantly charged with happiness.  The new Mr. and Mrs. Potter’s overflowing enthusiasm was as contagious as the Lupins’ had been contained.  The much larger church was packed to the bursting with just about anyone who wanted to celebrate the day that Lily Evans and James Potter finally tied the knot.  This turned out to be pretty much everyone who had ever known them.

            What felt like half of Hogwarts, most of the Ministry of Magic and all of their families let out a roar of approval after their first kiss as man and wife, scandalizing the preacher.  As they pulled away after the kiss and turned around ecstatically to face the cheering crowd, Lily saw Marissa whispering something in Remus’s ear from the front row.  A moment later, a smaller version of the cloud formation that Marissa had conjured at Hogwarts appeared over the ceiling of the church, with one that looked like Lily’s face next to it.

            The entire wedding party burst into laughter at once, just as the photographer snapped a picture.  The bride eyed her best friend shrewdly, smiling broadly.  It was with more than the sheer joy of being married, although that was enough to make her feel as if she could fly without a broom.  It relieved some of the tension that had existed ever since Marissa and Remus had declined to be in the wedding party.  They knew that it was too public a declaration of their loyalties for their missions.  The excuse they gave was Marissa’s health.  The ridiculous display may be a band-aid on a broken bone, but it was something.

            The party, a rowdy affair with dancing, toasts and an unfortunate bit of karaoke as Sirius and Peter got progressively drunker, was filled to the brim with people.  The Potters very public announcement of their happiness, a new kind of defiance of Voldemort, was entirely different than the quiet, reserved ceremony of the Lupins.

 

~*~*~

 

            Marissa ran her hand lightly over the copy of the _Inferno_ next to the pictures.  She stopped when her eyes landed on the ring on her finger.  She pulled her hand closer and gazed at the small circle of gold that proved she was Remus Lupin’s wife.  She smiled, remembering how she had commandeered the engagement ring his grandmother had given him.  After two months of him carrying it around and endless awkward moments where he chickened out, Marissa had, without saying a word, reaching into his pocket and taken out the ring box.  She had simply taken out the ring, put it on, and said nothing else about it.  It was three full months before he worked up the courage to ask her if she wanted to set a date.  It had taken that long for him to be sure that she wasn’t wearing it as a joke.

            Marissa smiled, playing idly with the ring that meant she belonged to Remus Lupin.

            As if she had taken strength from this small moment’s reverie, she picked up the small shard of mirror no bigger than her palm that lay on top of the book.  “Sirius Black,” she whispered firmly, remembering the day that he had given her this broken piece of his and James’s two-way mirrors.

 

~*~*~

 

            He had told her later that he had checked the street and the number dubiously six times before he was convinced that he had not stumbled up to the wrong house.  It was certainly not what he had expected from his blindly wizarding point of view. It was rather like the houses along the same street as his own, yet even grander and more ornate.  It was altogether the wrong house for Marissa Fletcher to have grown up in, this palace of a building.  It was showy and grand and ornate without real substance, everything that Marissa, for all her fabulous sense of showmanship, was not.

            When they had heard the story of “accidental” abuse by her drunk father, which necessitated James’s family taking the two Fletchers in for most of the summers since, Sirius had pictured a white trash hole in the wall.  There was almost nothing about Marissa Fletcher to indicate that she was practically Muggle royalty, except perhaps the way she had been able to handle those Slytherin heirs.

            "Sirius, come in," Marissa said cheerfully, for all the world as if she had been expecting him. "You and Peter are both very lucky that we tend to prefer the foremost rooms of the house. We'd never hear even that huge old knocker if we were in the back."

            "You do have a bell?" Sirius had said.  The depressed tone worried Marissa, but she bit her tongue.

            Instead she waved her hand at the gigantic foyer, “You think a house this size would lack for anything?”  Then she admonished him for not even wearing a coat and led him into the kitchen where she had tea all ready for two.

            Sirius raised an eyebrow at her, a quirk she had often envied, when she sat down calmly at one of the chairs and gestured for him to take the other. "Been expecting me?" he asked in surprise, practically diving forward to get the warm tea between his hands.

            "Of course," Marissa replied infuriatingly and took a dainty sip of tea. She was determined not to give up her secret yet.

            Sirius was obviously annoyed.  "How could you possibly know?" he all but snapped.

            Marissa didn't flinch at his tone, though she did put her cup down and regard him seriously, "Well, the Howler your mother sent this morning helped."

            Whatever he had been expecting, it clearly hadn’t been that.  "Don't worry, none of us will heed it,” Marissa continued brightly.  “She said to warn you she sent one to 'all your little friends, the filth and blood traitors, warning them not to harbor you. Apparently, the sky will fall on us if we cross her." Marissa sounded amused again as she took another tiny sip of her tea.

            "Worse than that, Riss," Sirius said candidly, sounding seriously worried about his friends well-being.  Marissa had met his mother and understood the impulse, but it was almost ridiculous to worry.

            "I put wards on the house long ago, Sirius, so did my mother, I now suspect," Marissa told him seriously. "I know the days we live in will be dark. With or without an old lady in Grimmauld Place out for my blood.”

            He was silent, simply staring at her for awhile.  "Have some tea, Sirius, you look as if you need it," she urged.  And he had.  It would be a wonder if he didn’t catch pneumonia or at least a whopping cold.

            Obediently, Sirius raised the cup to his lips and the piping hot liquid slid into his mouth and down his throat. The aftertaste that lingered, however, was decidedly alcoholic to Sirius's well-trained palette. "So is that the secret to your cheerfulness then?" Sirius asked with a brave imitation of his customary smirk.

            Marissa laughed briefly. "I picked the lock on the liquor cabinet this morning. I thought you might need a drink, even if it is just Muggle whiskey. Don't know how you drink that stuff personally, I tried a taste of it and ended up spitting it out in the sink."

            "That's _your_ story," Sirius said impishly, relieving a great deal of Marissa’s worries as he did so.

            She laughed again. "I don't have an owl, but you can call James from the phone whenever you want," she told him. "Mr. Potter’s not coming to pick me up for another two days, but he should probably come get you today.  He’s promised to bring his car.”

            "You have this all worked out?" Sirius said in surprise and gratitude.

            "You did your part in cutting ties with those - " Marissa cut herself off before she insulted his family. It was an old habit that she was not likely to break often. She leaned forward and said earnestly, "That took a lot of courage. I'm proud of you, Padfoot.”

            Marissa hadn’t been particularly aware that she was leaning in close to him or that their faces were only a few inches apart.  It came as a complete surprise when Sirius, impulsively, closed the distance between them in order to kiss her.

            Marissa had been shocked and quickly pulled away.  She just shook her head at him and said, "I think you need a little more of this." She produced the whiskey bottle from somewhere and poured more into his teacup.

            Sirius stared at her for a moment. Then he burst out laughing. "Don't be stingy," he said amiably, tilting the cup back and gulping it down the minute she finished pouring.  When he had drained it, she filled him another tea/whisky combination.  “I guess I should have learned the first time that the girls in my year are meant for different blokes,” Sirius said with a laugh.

            “You’re just trying to steal me from Severus because you don’t like him,” Marissa returned sharply.  “You wouldn’t have tried that if it were –“

            “Remus?” Sirius suggested.

            “I suppose he would qualify,” Marissa replied, shaking her head at her friend.

            “As ‘not Snape’ or as someone you would date?” Sirius asked, raising his eyebrows suggestively.

            “Drink your tea, Sirius Black,” Marissa said, shaking her head at him.

            “I’ll only get more lewd the drunker I get,” he warned her.

            “Then by all means, call the Potters quickly.”  They laughed, clinked their teacups together, and drank to that.

            Before he left that day, he had handed her a small piece of his mirror which had broken when it fell out of his pocket halfway through his walk through Muggle London.  “It doesn’t look like much,” he told her, “but you’ve got to remember that I’m not the richest little boy in school anymore before you look a gift horse in the mouth.”

            Marissa, who knew exactly what it was, just gave him a hug.  “Use it if you’re ever in trouble, all right?” he whispered in her ear just before they parted.

            “I won’t be staying with my father long,” she told him in his ear.

            “Whenever your greatest need comes.”

 

~*~*~

 

            “What is it James?” the voice from the mirror came a moment later.

            “Would you be terribly disappointed if it was just me?” she asked quietly, looking down and seeing a small part of Sirius Black’s face in the mirror.

            “Marissa?” he cried in surprise.  “How did you-“  There was panic in his voice.

            “You didn’t think I’d throw out that bit of mirror you gave me, did you?” she asked with a smile.

            “I-I guess…you haven’t used it in…actually I can’t think of a single time,” he said, sounding at a loss for words and extremely uncomfortable with the conversation.

            “I can only see your chin.  Would you at least lift it up so that I’m looking in your eyes?” she asked, partially because she wanted to see the expression in his eyes and partially because she wanted to reassure him that she couldn’t see any of his surroundings.  He let out a kind of sigh of relief that stung Marissa straight to the heart.  For a few seconds, she could barely breathe with the pain of seeing his obvious distrust.  The machines started to give a worried whoop before she remembered to inhale.

            He complied, however, with her request.  “Would you tell Lily and James…I don’t know…if they don’t agree to see me before I…would you tell them goodbye for me?”

            Sirius looked down for a minute before looking back through the mirror at her.

 

_In your eyes, I wanted to see the same old trust.  I wanted you to look me in the eyes and know that I loved you all and would never betray you.  That would be enough to make all the sacrifices worth it.  It wasn’t there, but I knew that I had to try all the same.  I knew that I still had to save you._

            “Marissa, I – I don’t know what to say.”

            “Neither do I, Sirius, neither do I.”  Tears stung Marissa’s eyes at this proof that she could not bridge that gap between them.

 

_In your eyes, I am a traitor._

 

            They were silent for a long moment.  She heard the door opening downstairs.  “I better go, goodbye, Sirius.”

            “Goodbye, Riss,” he said uncertainly half a second before he disappeared from view.

            “James,” she whispered, “I don’t know if you can hear me on this thing too.  I guess I couldn’t know that, could I?”  She took a deep breath to steady herself.  “I just wanted to say goodbye if you can hear me.  Tell Lily too, all right?  I…I can’t believe that you’d think I would choose anything over the two of you and Harry…but I can’t change that you obviously do.  I’m sorry that I let things get this bad.  I’m sorry that I let you think that we had betrayed you, that I didn’t stop it in time.  I’ll never forgive myself if – well, I won’t let it.  I love you guys.  Know that.  Look after Remus.”  She set the mirror upside down on the bedside table and settled back against the pillows.

            A moment later, the other person who Marissa had insisted that Gus tell of their whereabouts entered the room.  He stood in front of her, wary for an entirely different reason than Sirius had been.

            “Hello, Peter,” she said softly.


	6. Peter: The Reason I Betrayed You

**Chapter Five**

**The Reason I Betrayed You**

            But we were such good friends once.

            That’s what Peter Pettigrew knew that they would all say to him, at that inevitable moment when they realized  how thoroughly he had taken them in for years.  Someday, when he took his proper, official place on the winning side, after he condescended to plead for mercy for them in their defeat, they would answer his kindness only with that accusation.

            They would accuse him with the prank war in first year, and his orchestration of the Great Water Balloon Poltergeist Caper.  Not that that was hard.  He just gave Peeves water balloons to throw at Lupin, Fletcher and Evans (that would only land on Lupin, Fletcher and Evans).  A simple enough prank and bit of magic really, although as first years they had all been duly impressed at the time, especially the two Muggle-reared victims of the plot.  He had started the tradition of giving their schemes grand titles.  They tended to forget that.  He had tried to convince them once.  Black and Potter had insisted that they had named their exploit on the first night before they even knew him.  In vain would he argue that he had named it for them later.  But he hadn’t really minded at the time.  Let them think whatever they wanted.  They would anyway.  It didn’t make them like Peter any less.

            They also never seemed to remember that it had been his humble suggestion that made them the terror of Hogwarts and proved them beyond brilliant to all who found out afterwards.  The idea to become Animagi was not the genius of Potter or the cunning of Black.  It had been the ability of Peter Pettigrew to see the simple, obvious things that everyone else seemed to miss or glance over.  Then again, what was he expecting?  He knew that they were all stupid, really.  They were brilliant and clever by turns, of course, but obvious; and they fell for obvious tricks.

            Except Fletcher.  Oh, she was ridiculous and simple-minded and idealistic, but she wasn’t stupid underneath her blonde hair.  She was as subtle as the rest were blunt, or could at least recognize fine subtlety.  She had figured it out.  Why else would she have her brat brother tell him where she was?  By an owl, no less?  She feared him.  She knew.  Well, it should be an interesting evening.  He wondered what she would accuse him with tonight.

            Would it be how he had shown up at the Muggle hospital after her second surgery?  No, she had had eyes only for Lupin then.  Would it be with how he had kept Evans from turning back when she began to suspect that Fletcher and Black were luring her and Potter into the Chocolate Room as a trap?  No, they seemed to have forgotten about that, his part in it at least.  Would it be the first day that they had met on the train?  Oh, that’s right.  No one remembered that he was involved in the First Great Gus Caper.  

            By the Staff of Merlin, there really was no denying it, was there?

_In your eyes, I am invisible._

            That was the precise reason that Black had given for making him Secret Keeper, right?  That he was invisible?  That no one in their right mind would ever dream that the Potters would trust pathetic little Peter Pettigrew with their lives?

            It didn’t really bother Peter anymore.  He had been hearing it too long.  By the Staff of Merlin, he had been hearing it since their first night at Hogwarts.  The prefect had actually turned to Fletcher and Lupin after her brother left and told them, “I can tell I’m going to have a lot of trouble with you two this year.”

            Peter had wanted to shout, “I’m standing right here!”  He had ridden in their compartment.  He had helped them sneak Gus into the boat and across the Lake.  Hadn’t he, at Remus’s suggestion, lent him one of his spare robes?  Why did those two get all the credit for causing an uproar at the Sorting when there appeared to be a first year left over (on top of the four who were missing)?

            But he hadn’t, and as the weeks went by, he began to feel very glad indeed that he hadn’t been associated with the hiding of Fletcher’s brother.  Instead, he could join the side of the two boys who had strutted into the Great Hall like they owned the place.  Not that it kept him from being invisible, except to them.  At least for awhile.

            It had been only in this past year that he learned the usefulness of being invisible.  Before it had smarted and burned and warped him.  Now, he could fully appreciate it.  He was so invisible that Lily didn’t notice him sabotaging their missions.  He was so invisible that she always blamed herself and never even considered that it might have been her partner’s fault that they were almost captured or nearly killed.  He was so invisible that none of them noticed his suspicious absences to report to the Dark Lord.  He was so invisible that they would never see him coming.

            Once, he had Apparated away, made a brief report, and returned to the same room to find that they hadn’t noticed he was gone.  They could not even see what was right under their noses.

            That was why the Dark Lord was destined to win.  He saw everything.  He never underestimated anyone.

 

-_-_-

 

            “Hello, Peter.  Thank you for joining us.  Took you long enough.  I was beginning to think that your spell hadn’t worked, Avery.”

 

_-_-_

            “Hello, Peter,” she said softly.

            “Hello, Marissa,” he replied with a tentative smile that he had long ago perfected, when he realized that it made him seem most sincere.  “How have you been?” he asked, letting some of his awkwardness in this meeting show.  He had found that it helped to smooth over any worries or weird slips in interactions with his friends.  In truth, this had surprised Peter, which was why he had resisted it so long.  Didn’t they remember how he had been in school?  He never said anything unless he was certain about it.  He was always articulate and concise.  Why did they accept his somewhat stumbling, awkward behavior as the “way he had always been”?  Ah, right, the invisible thing again.

 

-_-_-

 

            What had the man called the other? Abey? Was that his name? Was that even a name? What was going on? There was blood and his father looked dead and the men were holding his mother who was standing there with a blank expression on her face. Imperius? Or something else? If so, why hadn't he been hit yet? What was this? Why wasn't she already dead? Why hadn't they already killed Peter? Did Death Eaters like to play with their food?

            "He's gaping like a fish," the first man said.

 

_-_-_

 

            Fletcher smiled wryly, “Machines and medicine schedules run my life.”  She waved at an IV stand with multiple bags and a respirator, both of which were hooked up to her.  “At the very least, whenever Remus isn’t in the room.  Then he runs my life.”  She waved at the chair next to her bed.

            Peter sat down and just looked at her.  He had a feeling that he knew what this meeting was about.  He could see it in her eyes.  It made him want to laugh, sometimes.  The Potters and Black really would believe anything but that he had the guts to betray them, wouldn’t they?  Marissa bloody Lupin could never hide a single emotion.  They thought that she had it in her to be a spy?

            The only thing more delusional was her little mission tonight.  She really did see herself as some kind of angel descending to Earth to rescue the poor lost souls, didn’t she?  She thought that she could combat the loyalty of the Dark Lord’s followers?  The binding spells that he placed on them?  She had seen _It’s a Wonderful Life_ too many times.  She had started confusing Death Eaters with Jimmy Stewart.

 

-_-_-

 

            "Perhaps throwing water in his face would wipe the shock off it?" another suggested.

            "All right, Malfoy, but I still think that your participation here isn't the greatest idea," the first man said. "He might remember you. Now, if not later, it could be an issue.”

 

_-_-_

 

            “I haven’t seen you in a few days now,” she told him, as if this were some kind of problem.

            Peter indulged in a rare treat.  He called her on her bullshit. “I saw you Saturday night, and we’ve gone much longer stretches without my absence bothering you.”  He figured he could afford it.  After all, he was supposed to believe that she – ha! – was the traitor in their midst.

            Fletcher did look very disconcerted by his statement.  She even took a minute to recover herself.  “I suppose so.  And we’ve certainly been up to all kinds of things since then to keep us busy.”  Here, Peter was utterly shocked.  Had Fletcher just brought up, utterly voluntarily, the awkward subjects of their exclusion from the Fidelius Charm and her recent capture?  Well, it was certainly in her power to be direct, but…

            In a flash, Peter understood where she was going.  He practically laughed out loud.  This was the extent of her subtlety then?  Well, he would play along.  This was as amusing a way as any for this conversation to go.

 

-_-_-

 

            "All right, Malfoy, but I still think that your participation here isn't the greatest idea," the first man said. "He might remember you. Now, if not later, it could be an issue.”

            "You don't have to bother with the confusion spell. He'll either be one of us or a convict at the end of this. He can't betray us either way," the man Mafley said. Mafley? No, that wasn't his name. It wasn't. Peter knew his real name.

            He didn't care enough to fight the confusion spell. His father was dead, and his mother was just standing there obviously in their control. Then there was that bloody knife just sitting there glaring at him. He felt like he would faint.

            He swayed and immediately felt his legs and torso stiffen, and he was forced to remain upright and conscious. Then the coldest water that he had ever felt hit him full-force in the face. It was like a punch from a snowman. He was thrown back, but he couldn't move and was yanked back against the force of the water shooting at him. He couldn't breathe and he couldn't think of anything else either.

            "Enough, Malfoy," the first man said.

            Instantly the water stopped and Peter stood there sputtering and coughing, fighting for breath. Before he could regain any small part of his composure, the first man who appeared to be in charge of this raid said, "Now, now, this isn't the time to get all weepy on us, Petey boy.”

 

_-_-_

 

            “I suppose we have,” he replied evenly.  He half expected her to out with her accusation immediately.  She could have easily followed this exchange with, “And just what have you been up to, Peter?”  However, this was apparently the end of Fletcher’s bluntness.  Instead, Peter decided to go on the offensive in this pathetically one-sided battle of wits.  “I see that you have relocated yourself, and from the fact that Mundungus had to inform me of your whereabouts you are taking unprecedented precautions.”

            “The Fidelius Charm is being used very frequently these days by our little circle,” she replied.  Peter wished that she would get on with it.  Let her play her little “trick” on him.  She was only leading him where he had intended to go all along.  He did not come here out of any lingering affection for her or for some sort of absolution or even to say goodbye.  He came to find out, on Malfoy’s orders, who had helped her escape.

            “You certainly had reason to protect yourself,” Peter said, deciding to speed up the process.

            Fletcher played her party perfectly.  She really could be a superb actress when she wanted to be.  She looked at him for a moment in feigned confusion, and then said very softly, with almost no expression, “Why would you say that, Peter?  You couldn’t even have known about my capture, could you?  How would you?”

 

-_-_-

 

            "You-you killed my father?" Peter could have bitten his tongue for the question that tumbled out of his mouth. Why couldn't he be brave? He knew what James and Sirius and Remus would have done in this situation. They would have said something clever and stood there bravely and proudly. They wouldn't have let their fear show. But fear was all that Peter had. Everything else was numb and shock and grief that fear was pushing aside

 

_-_-_

 

            Peter’s eyes hardened.  “You bitch,” he said harshly, “you’ve known all along.”  Real anger surged through him.  So she wasn’t going to probe him, feeling for answers.  Her suspicions were already formed, and she had not waited for any confirmation.  He had not been able to garner the needed information before the inevitable accusation.  No, she had simply set up a ridiculously simple, almost infantile, trap and sprung it without any delay.  Truly, he had hoped for more from the girl who had thought she was matching wits and wills with Lucius Malfoy for four years.

            Then, in another flash, Peter understood again.  Malfoy had sent him on a fool’s errand, and he had known it.  Malfoy wanted one of the only people who knew where the blasted girl who had beaten him was to be forced into a position where he would have to kill her.  He would have liked the information, but he had never expected it.  He had expected exactly this.  He couldn’t directly order Peter to kill her, but he could order him to go ask awkward questions and have to kill her when she figured it out.

            They stared at each other, his eyes blazing with anger and hers steadily holding his with no less anger.  But hers was tempered with sympathy.  She was trying to reach out to him.  “How long have you suspected?” he asked, in a lazy air he had learned from his fellows, sitting back in his chair as if he had not a care in the world.  He hated being manipulated, but Malfoy’s ploy had worked.  Nothing about the conversation really mattered now.

            “A year,” she said earnestly.

            “Only one year off,” he replied in the same tone, which must sound so foreign to her ears, judging from the expression on her face.

 

-_-_-

 

            The man's lips curled nastily. "We haven't quite figured that out yet, Petey boy. So we're leaving it up to you," he said. His voice was thick and catlike. It sounded exactly like a cat playing with its food.

 

_-_-_

 

            Truthfully, he was disturbed that her suspicions went back that far.  He was doubly glad that he had taken extensive measures before that point to ensure that she would not have been believed had she come to the Potters with her suspicions.

            “Why, Peter?” she asked simply, “why didn’t you come to us?”

 

-_-_-

 

            "What do you mean you don't know who killed him?" if Peter could have managed an angry or challenging tone, it would have been a great thing to say. It came out fearful and uncertain, however, which was unlikely to be successful with these monsters. What was he going to do? He knew the answer to that.  He was going to die. He wouldn't even die a man like his father undoubtedly had. He would die scared out of his mind and begging for mercy.

            "Well, we just can't figure out what happened here. So we're letting you chime in," he said nastily. "You see, we've narrowed it down to two possibilities. Either, in the midst of the terrible fight that all the neighbors will bear witness to, your mother took a knife and killed him as they all wondered if she someday would...or you did it. After all, you hated them fighting. Your mother was your favorite. They were dreadfully stubborn about not breaking up and you just couldn't take it anymore. The neighbors have seen you yelling and stomping out of the house to get away from it. Terrible thing to do to a child, but what can you do with them once they're already warped?”

 

_-_-_

 

            “We could have helped you,” she told him earnestly.

 

-_-_-

 

            Peter had no words. "That's not what happened," he whispered. He could have punched himself. Nothing would have been better. He should have stuck with saying nothing.

            "Really? No one else was here. What else could have happened?" the man said sounding highly amused in his mock curiosity. "Surely you're not seriously expecting that old burglar defense to work?”

            Peter just shook his head in disbelief. His mind felt permanently boggled. The confusion spell wouldn't even let him think about anything clearly. The only thing that was penetrating was that it was somehow going to be his choice who killed his father. "Now, I have a feeling that we can solve this pretty simply. It's just a matter of whose fingerprints are on that knife. It's either yours or your mother's. That will tell us.”

            Peter's eyes darted to the knife and remained fixed there. Slowly, the knife rose up into the air. It hovered between himself and his mother. He felt his arm whip up of its own accord as if tied with ropes from the ceiling that had just been pulled tight. His mother blissfully extended her hand as well.

 

_-_-_

 

            “We still can,” Fletcher was saying.  “It’s not too late.”

 

-_-_-

 

            "Who was it then, Petey boy? You or your mother?  You make the call. Shall we move the knife into your mother's hands or your own? Both have consequences. Would you like to hear them?" the man asked with the air of a professor sharing a fun fact with the class. "If you choose your mother's hands, then you will join us. Only fair, as we have saved you from Azkaban. You will serve the Dark Lord as a spy within Dumbledore’s precious Order of the Phoenix and tell us everything about Lily and James Potter and Sirius Black. Your mother will undoubtedly go to Azkaban though perhaps as a Muggle she will have a reduced sentence. Perhaps a greater one. Who can tell? One minute the world is happy and gay, and the next it is bleak and gray. Oh, well I guess you know that now, Petey boy, don't you?”

 

_-_-_

 

            “You don’t have to do any of this.  You can get out of it at any time, Wormtail.”

 

-_-_-

 

            "Or would you prefer to be called Wormtail? That is your old nickname, isn't it? Tell me, would your friends want you to be noble? I suppose you could be thinking that now. But consider what that would entail to save your mother. You would go to Azkaban for killing your father. The rest of your life, you would be behind bars with Dementors to suck the few good memories you have away from you. You would relive this moment constantly with every other that pains you. You would never know if we let your mother live after all you went through to save her. You would live doubting and wondering and torturing yourself and in a prison of your memory of this moment and this choice.”

 

_-_-_

 

            “They’ve made you think that you don’t have any choice, but you do, Peter, you do.”

            Peter found his voice.  “Am I really that weak in your eyes?” he demanded in a cold, biting tone that he had never shown to his friends before.  “Do you really think me so stupid?”

            “Peter, you fell for one of his tricks, but you don’t have to stay with him,” Marissa urged him, leaning forward in her earnestness, her eyes boring into his with unwanted sympathy and false understanding.  “You have a choice, always.  You can choose a different path.”

 

-_-_-

 

            "Is that to be the rest of your life, Wormtail? Dementors and lost friends and no one left to love or care for you? No one will ever know the noble thing you did. No one will ever believe it. You will be a monster to them. Or will you become the monster and let them think you the angel? Will you spy and serve the Dark Lord or let everyone think that you did anyway while you rot in Azkaban and relive this moment and the others to come until your life is worthless even to you?”

 

_-_-_

 

            “Will you shut up?” he asked coldly, regarding her with no expression on his face but the pure annoyance that he felt at her words.

            “Peter-“

            “Shut up, Fletcher!” he yelled at her, surprised to find himself on his feet and her silenced.  “What do you know of any of it?  You think because you have tea with Narcissa Malfoy you know anything of the Dark Arts?  Or of the choice laid before me?  Ha!  A choice?  What choice?  The choice between life and power or death and futility!”

 

-_-_-

 

            Peter closed his eyes, unable to see the knife come any closer. It wafted toward his mother and he couldn't suppress the relief he felt at having it further away or the horror at his mother's fate as well as his own that that choice too would present.

            "You see, Petey boy, no one ever joins the Dark Lord under coercion. It's always a choice. They always have a way out. Azkaban is yours, and that little knife.”

 

_-_-_

 

            “What about virtue and honor and loyalty?” she entreated him.  “What of them?  Can you honestly say that you do not miss what this cost you?”

 

-_-_-

 

            The case against Mrs Emily Pettigrew was flimsy.  The jury was well-picked despite Dumbledore’s attempt to influence it.  Muggle neighbors trooped in to testify to her extremely strained relationship with her husband.  One even testified that she knew it was bound to happen someday.  The only thing that the Wizengamot lacked to put the first Muggle in Azkaban was hard evidence.  However, Mrs. Pettigrew's defense quite made up for this lacking. It would be said in the papers and for years to come when the case was discussed that the testimony of these two witnesses convicted Emily Pettigrew: her own and her son's.

 

_-_-_

 

            Peter just laughed.  “You are such an idealist,” he said scornfully.  “You never could take your head out of the clouds enough to see reality, could you?  I would have liked to see what you would have done in my shoes that day.”

            “What could have seduced you?  Cold power over the love of friends?”

            “Because the love of friends has sustained you so well,” he spat back in her face to revenge that ignorant jibe.

 

-_-_-

 

            "So, we're all waiting. What will it be, Wormtail? We're waiting with bated breath for your decision.”

 

_-_-_

 

            “They never turned on you!” she cried more passionately.  “You’re misguided –“

            Then Peter laughed again, hard this time.  Finally, he said, “Misguided?” he asked in an amused tone.  “Is that what I am, Mrs. Lupin?”  He shook his head at her, “No, you are misguided.  You who think that you can snatch back souls from the darkness.  Do you never cease to underestimate your opponent?

            “He has powers that you cannot imagine, both for destruction and for binding his followers to him.  That is why no one has ever joined the Dark Lord’s forces under coercion.  Otherwise he could not bind their fate to his forever.  Only willful obedience, and, once given, it will always be his.  It is certainly not in the power of some silly blonde Gryffindor to combat his power.  And besides, what is there, really, to be gained by resisting him?”

            “What?” she cried, astonished.  Peter was relieved to see that he was at last getting through to her.  “You mean…” she said slowly, dumbly, “you really have betrayed them?  Chosen…Voldemort’s side?  Of your own free will?  It’s not some mistake, some coerced, terrified threat they’re holding over you?  You chose this?”  From her broken voice, he had shaken and possibly upended her entire world.

 

-_-_-

 

            “And do you know, _Wormtail_ , what you will see even more often? The look on your friends faces. They will change, you know, throughout the trial. First it will be disbelief, horror that this could happen to you. Then the horror becomes not your dilemma but you yourself and their disbelief is not that you would be accused of this but disbelief of your rather wild story of Death Eaters who use Muggle weapons to kill. Why would Death Eater want to recruit a talentless thing like you, after all? Why would wizards use a knife from your kitchen?”

 

_-_-_

 

            Peter was formulating an appropriately scornful reply when, with an inarticulate cry of rage, she launched herself at him, trying to claw with her hands at him.  He leapt back and she toppled to the floor along with her IV stand.

            He stood far enough back that she could not lunge out at him again, and he suspected from the way that she collapsed onto the floor that she did not have another burst of energy in her.  She did not look up at him, only said in a miserable voice that betrayed the tears undoubtedly falling from her eyes, “Why, Peter?”  She shook her head.  “Lily and James, Peter?”  She glanced up at him, proving that he had not been mistaken in the least in his imagination of her expression.  “Lily and James?”

 

-_-_-

 

            “Slowly, they will begin to invent things that will prove that they should have known all along. They will all turn on you. They will despise you, hate you, wish that they had never let you into their circle. All of them. They will stop fighting for you. Even your mother. She, as long or short as she lives, will remember only this. She'll testify against you, of course, under Imperius. Then we'll modify her memory. Everyone will think you a killer. You will deserve your fate to them. Then they will forget you entirely.”

 

_-_-_

 

            “How could you, Peter?” she whispered.  “How could you?”

            “Self-preservation,” Peter told her simply, “was always something that I prized far more than the rest of you did.”

            “You’re their Secret Keeper, aren’t you?” she whispered in a terrified but certain voice.  Then she covered her face with her hands.  “I was too late.”

            “You were too late two years ago,” he spat at her, harshly.  “You were too late before you were born.  The Dark Lord is irresistible.  Even for your little pet projects.  Did you really think that you, an almost powerless, naïve simpleton, could contend with the will of the Dark Lord?  That you could steal his protégés from his side?  With what?  Your smiles and your empty assurances?

            “You let yourself be fooled by your early successes with weaklings like Regulus Black,” he spat at her.  “And look what your ‘saving’ did for him.  If that’s all that you can offer, no thanks, Fletcher.”

            “I offer you nothing,” she whispered quietly, “except the chance to reclaim who you were before whatever happened to you.”

 

-_-_-

 

            “So do you see, yet, what little good your friends will do for you in the end?  Now and every time that you really need them they can do nothing for you.  Why suffer so much for those who would not do the same for you?  Who would abandon you in your time of need?  Why let your mother die and yourself suffer?  For those who belittle you, exclude you, ignore you?  Who would forget you and not even miss you?  For those who can offer you nothing?”

 

_-_-_

 

            “I am strong now,” Peter said.  “I am no longer preoccupied with this ridiculous obsession with ‘right’ and ‘wrong.’  There are only two absolutes that matter: what a man can bear and what he can’t.  I can’t go to Azkaban.  I can’t withstand evil for so meager a reward.  I can turn on those –“

            “Who love you,” Fletcher could only whisper miserably, starting to gasp into the respirator still, by some miracle, attached to her.

            “Who used me,” Peter corrected, “and, as this conversation has made clear once and for all, never really saw me.”

            As if on cue, Marissa looked up at him, her tear-filled eyes meeting his.

            This moment was the chink in Peter Pettigrew’s armor.  Marissa Fletcher-Lupin had always been the angel in his life.  The only thing that he had ever asked the Dark Lord for besides forgiveness was to extend her life.  She would have died long ago if not for him.  He had simpered after her at Hogwarts, getting nowhere for all of his efforts at flattery and attention.  But he had been too weak then to win her love.  He had been nothing to her.  Now, he was brilliant and strong.  If she could see that…then maybe he would find the strength in himself.  After all, Marissa Fletcher had always seen things in him that he couldn’t see himself.  If she could, just for one moment, see him as strong and brave…

            If anyone could prove that vile Death Eater wrong, surely it must be her, and this was the last moment in which she would have the chance…

 

_In your eyes, I wanted to see respect.  I wanted you to look me in the eyes and know that I was clever and brilliant and great and still had something worthwhile in me.  That would have been enough for me to be brave.  But it wasn’t there, and I knew that you would never see anything good in me again._

            So Peter Pettigrew decided that it was time for the light in her eyes to go out.  He had prolonged her life.  He could end it.  The Dark Lord saw her as a threat, and now she knew his secret.  Even if she would have no way of communicating it to the Potters and Black probably wouldn’t see her, it was too dangerous now to let her live.  Dumbledore, after all, tended to still believe her despite his best efforts.

            He walked calmly to the outlet where the respirator was attached.  He reached down and pulled the plug.  Then he ripped the IV out of her arm.

            She grabbed his hand and held him fast when he did so.  Her gaze bored into his.  She opened her mouth to speak, perhaps to say words that she thought could reclaim him, but instead a violent coughing fit seized her.  She shook, her body racked with them, long enough for him to walk calmly out of the room.

            Then Peter Pettigrew formulated his plan.  He sent the Dark Mark into the sky.  Then he blasted open the door to the shed where Remus had sequestered himself.  He transformed immediately and waited, in his rat form, for the Ministry to arrive.

            He watched as Remus bounded towards the room where his wife lay already dying or even dead, depending on how desperately she needed that respirator.  He waited for the Ministry and the Order to arrive, subdue the werewolf and find him hiding in the broom closet.  The Ministry would accept his account of coming upon the house of an old friend who had wanted to see him one last time to find the werewolf already escaped and the woman already dead in a brutal attack.  Dumbledore, Black and the Potters would accept his story of Death Eaters luring him to the house through the Lupins to capture him and his narrow escape from the escaped werewolf.

            All would still go according to plan.  After all, he was the Marauder with an escape plan for every contingency.  He was the survivor.

            But Marissa Lupin had the last word, for Peter could not forget despite all that he had accomplished, despite the fact that he had outsmarted them all yet again, that she had seen in him what he feared beyond anything else.

 

_In your eyes, I am weak._

_-_-_-_-_-_-_-

            “And do you know what you will see even more often, Wormtail?  The look on your friends faces.  They will change you know.  First it will be horror that this could happen to you.  Then the horror becomes not your dilemma but you yourself…they will despise you, hate you, wish that they had never let you into their circle.  Then they will forget you entirely…”

 

-_-_-_-_-_-_-_

The End of Peter Pettigrew

_-_-_-_-_-_-_-

 

            A flash of blue-white light erupted from the wands of Remus Lupin and Sirius Black. For a moment, Peter was frozen in midair, his small body twisting madly. Ronald Weasley yelled as the rat fell and hit the floor. There was another blinding flash of light.

            Then Peter began to sprout, his head shooting upward from the ground; limbs popping out. Then the man that Lupin had thought dead for so many long years, whose death he had mourned as the final cruel blow in the end of the War, the man that was responsible for the twelve years of darkness and despair that Black had suffered, the man who had betrayed him and given him the strength to escape Azkaban itself, was before them again. Of all the things that could have been going through their minds as their old friend, their betrayer, leapt into their lives again, the only thought that popped into both of their minds was that Peter had changed as much as they.

            But he was still up to his old tricks. He was already sniffing for the exits.  This one would be tricky, but hadn’t he outsmarted Mrs. Norris countless times?  "Well, hello, Peter," Lupin said pleasantly, casually. "Long time no see." Peter wondered if Fletcher would have spoken to him that way. Lupin wouldn't have been able to do it before he married her.  Their habits had started to merge into one over those three short years.

            "S-Sirius ... R-Remus," for his first words in twelve years, it was rather disappointing. Considering the dire nature of the situation, he really should have done better.  He was certainly capable of much greater eloquence.  "My friends ... my old friends..." That was considerably worse. Black raised his wand, and Lupin had to hold him back. Lupin gave him a stern look, the same one that Peter had used to turn his friend's against him years ago.  He knew better than that.  Why had he said it?

            Lupin’s voice was calm and pleasant as if he were doing nothing more personal than teaching a history lesson, "We've been having a little chat, Peter, about what happened the night Lily and James died. You might have missed the finer points while you were squeaking around down there on the bed -"

            Lupin was going to make him squirm. He was going to watch him squirm and squeak about fearfully. His vendetta was all the years of being alone and having to wait. He would make Peter be all alone as the world crashed down upon him. Black just wanted to blast him apart.  Lupin wanted to torture him slowly.  Fletcher might have done better to do that than lunging at him in that ridiculous manner.

            “Remus,” Peter gasped, unused to using his voice after all of these years. “You don’t believe him, do you ... he tried to kill me, Remus...” Words would not flow now. It had been too long since he had last used them. If he could just think in words again, his ability to talk his way out of anything would have returned. It might even have been enough (he had, after all, convinced far more demanding audiences than three thirteen year old wizards), but he could not summon that gift now. He didn’t have to convince Lupin, who was probably a lost cause at this point. He only had to convince Harry and Ron and Hermione. Lupin could argue to them all he wanted if Peter could just convince them. Even Black wouldn’t harm Peter if those three took a stand for him. But words would not return. Everything he said fell into logic traps that he could have avoided without even so much as blinking twelve years ago. He had been good at lying and getting away with it. The skill, however, was woefully out of practice.

            “No one’s going to try and kill you until we’ve sorted a few things out,” Lupin said, staring at Peter as if he knew what he had done to his wife. Lupin was looking at him calmly, and his voice was steady, but his eyes burned into him with such hate as if he already knew that Peter had destroyed his world not once but twice. Would he ask?

            If he would only ask, then Peter could derail the discussion and get it back on his terms, with him firmly in control of the situation. After all, Black and Lupin would still be thrown by talk of Fletcher. They rollicked in guilt about Lily and James, but they could not be shaken.  They had relived that tragedy too many times in the past twelve years.  They were ready for him with every single line of discussion he tried to provoke concerning the Potters. If only he could get them to mention Fletcher.  Lupin would immediately withdraw into guilt, and Black would glance sideways at that very friend.  At the very least, they would be thrown enough that he could take control of the situation, or better yet transform and get the hell out of there.

            “Sorted things out?” he squealed. “I knew he’d come after me! I knew he’d be back for me! I’ve been waiting for this for twelve years!”

            Lupin was ready on that argument, and Peter’s reply about Dark powers produced the most frightening sound yet.  Black laughed darkly. It sounded like Regulus’s victorious cackle of laughter.  Like he had laughed as the Aurors led him away.  Peter flinched to hear it.

            As the discussion continued, Peter considered telling them the truth.  How he had been cornered with Death Eaters and threats of killing his mother.  He nearly immediately dismissed the idea. The knowledge that he sent someone else to Azkaban would scarcely calm Black now. It didn’t even really matter anymore why he had done what he had done. Black went on about why he thought Peter had joined them in the first place – as if the Dark Lord were a _protector!_ As if the Dark Lord had been trying to help him! As if he wouldn’t have had a much better time on Dumbledore’s side even if he did end up dead by the end of it! He caught himself mumbling about the lunacy of Black’s pathetic, ignorant theories out loud.

            And as for Black thinking that he would want to rejoin his master if given the chance, Peter _was_ looking out for that. The thing was, he was looking out for that in fear. Yes, he was scared of the Dark Lord’s old supporters, but because they could always control him. He was on the lookout for the Dark Lord himself so that he would know how to come back to him in a way that wouldn’t get him killed on the spot. He was _afraid_ that his master would return. He knew that, if he did, he had to be ready for it.

            Then Black was explaining how he escaped. Peter was somewhat impressed that he had figured out his plan. He hadn’t originally intended it, of course. He had been Ron’s brother’s rat originally. It was pure dumb luck that he ended up in the same room as Harry three years ago. But Peter could improvise. If he could do that, then he would have a place on the winning side when they rose again. He would save his last, ultimate betrayal, however, for when he would be honored for it rather than killed. Why do it when Albus Dumbledore would find him and kill him? Why not wait until the dark Lord would reward him? Why not wait until Dumbledore had bigger fish to fry?

            “Believe me,” croaked Black. “Believe me. I never betrayed James and Lily. I would have died before I betrayed them.” This was all that Sirius had wanted for twelve years, Peter knew. He wanted the forgiveness of a Potter. He wanted to be believed. That was what he craved above all.  It was what had always made him weak.

            The last remaining Potter nodded. Peter shrieked. How he had longed to be forgiven even longer than Black, and he would never be granted it. He would never receive that swift nod of forgiveness and belief and trust.  Of _respect._   Of _love._   “Sirius - it’s me … it’s Peter … your friend … you wouldn’t …” But Peter knew that Black would even before he kicked out at him. He knew that Black would go through with killing him, that he wouldn’t back out, when he had spoken about his “prank” on Snape so coldly a few minutes ago. He still believed just as strongly as he had then that death was a fitting punishment even for lesser crimes. He didn’t regret trying to kill Snape all these years later.

            “There’s filth enough on my robes without you touching them,” Black snarled at him. Peter heard that cruel Death Eater’s voice out of his memory of so long ago. _Terrible thing to do to a child, but what can you do with them once they're already warped?_

“Remus!” Peter cried imploringly, reaching out for his last lousy string to pull. “You don’t believe this … Wouldn’t Sirius have told you if they’d changed the plan?” That had been his plan if it ever came to his word against Black’s – Lupin’s estrangement would save his neck yet again.

            But not this time. “Not if he thought I was the spy, Peter,” Lupin said calmly. He had truly learned to keep his inner demons under control. Then again, werewolves had to master this. They had so much practice as well. “I assume that’s why you didn’t tell me, Sirius?” He looked casually over his head. It was the same flippant tone that that horrible Death Eater had used years ago. _Who can tell? One minute the world is happy and gay, and the next it is bleak and gray. Oh, well I guess you know that now, Petey boy, don't you?_

“Forgive me, Remus,” said Black.

            “Not at all, Padfoot, old friend,” said Lupin as he rolled up his sleeves. It pained Peter how easily that forgiveness had been given when he would never have any in the rest of his (probably short) life. “And you will, in turn, forgive me for believing you were the spy?”  

            “Of course,” said Black, the ghost of a grin on his face. They could erase all of his work so casually, could they?  They were stripping him of his power, his accomplishment, his victory over them!  His great trick that proved he was in their league after all.  The great work of his life, and they had waived it aside in a moment.  Even more than when Evans had pulled the Dark Lord out from under him, this was when they erased Peter Pettigrew’s life completely.  This moment was their revenge, if only they knew it.  “Shall we kill him together?”

            “Yes, I think so,” Lupin said seriously.

            “Ron, haven’t I been a good friend … a good pet? You won’t let them kill me, Ron, will you … you’re on my side, aren’t you?” Oh, let him have one friend left in the world, even it was only a boy that had thought him a rat all these years.  One person who thought that he was worth saving.

            “I let you sleep in my _bed!_ ” he cried in revulsion. _Everyone will think you a killer. You will deserve your fate to them. Then they will forget you entirely._

“Kind boy … kind master … you won’t let them do it … I was your rat … I was a good pet …”

            “If you made a better rat than human, it’s not much to boast about, Peter,” 

Black said harshly. What did he know about it? Ron yanked his broken leg out of his grasp. Black had said it himself, emotions were less intense in his animal form. Rats were never faced with impossible choices. They were never given a choice between a life you would hate and a fate worse than death. It was easy to be a good rat. Life was simple as a rat. As a rat, he had never been given an impossible choice. _You see, Petey boy, no one ever joins the Dark Lord under coercion. It's always a choice. They always have a way out. Azkaban is yours, and that little knife. So, we're all waiting. What will it be, Wormtail? We're waiting with bated breath for your decision._

“Sweet girl … clever girl … you – you won’t let them … help me …” he said, pulling on the hem of the girl Hermione’s robes. She was the one with sense. She was the one in their group most like him.  Sensible, cool-headed.  They shared the desperate need to prove that they belonged with the close group of boys who meant the most to them.  She would know better than to kill him. But she pulled her robes out of his reach and turned toward the wall. _They will despise you, hate you, wish that they had never let you into their circle. All of them. They will stop fighting for you._

There was nothing left for it. “Harry … Harry … you look just like your father … just like him…” Peter didn’t care how low it was anymore. There was nothing else to be done and no more tricks up his sleeve. He didn’t care if it made him vermin to use James to save his skin when he had sacrificed James for his own. He had known long before that that he could never be forgiven. He had known when Marissa died. He was vermin. There was no scrap of honor left. There was no going back.  That was the choice that he had made when she died.  Once and for all.  He didn’t care anymore after that.  He had found the strength simply to do what needed to be done, ignoring the screaming conscience that only caused problems.

            “HOW DARE YOU SPEAK TO HARRY?” Black roared at him. “HOW DARE YOU FACE HIM? HOW DARE YOU TALK ABOUT JAMES IN FRONT OF HIM?”

            “Harry,” he whispered carefully, shuffling towards him as humbly as possible. “Harry, James wouldn’t have wanted me killed … James would have understood, Harry … he would have shown mercy…” But he was being yanked back and dragged backwards along the floor by his two former friends. _And do you know, Wormtail, what you will see even more often? The look on your friends faces. They will change, you know._

“You sold Lily and James to Voldemort,” Black demanded, wanting to hear him say it. “Do you deny it?” _First it will be disbelief, horror that this could happen to you. Then the horror becomes not your dilemma but you yourself._

Peter burst into tears. He felt the truth rising up within him. He wanted to tell them before he died, his last fling with inconsequential feelings. “Sirius, Sirius, what could I have done? The Dark Lord … you have no idea … he has weapons you can’t imagine … I was scared, Sirius, I was never brave like you and Remus and James. I never meant it to happen … He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named forced me-“

            But Black would hear none of it. He would not wait to hear that if Peter hadn’t joined them the Death Eaters would have killed his mother. He did not want to hear that Peter had been nineteen and terrified and Confunded. “DON’T LIE! YOU’D BEEN PASSING INFORMATION TO HIM A YEAR BEFORE LILY AND JAMES DIED! YOU WERE HIS SPY!” Despite the terrible situation, Peter could help feeling a flickering of pride that he had fooled them so well even now. They thought that it had only been a _year?_ As if he could be far gone enough to kill Lily and James after just _one year!_   For all her naiveté and stupidity, Fletcher was the only one with eyeballs, wasn’t she?

            Then panic overwhelmed him again. “He – he was taking over everywhere! Wh-what was to be gained by refusing him?” _Is that to be the rest of your life, Wormtail? Dementors and lost friends and no one left to love or care for you? No one will ever know the noble thing you did. No one will ever believe it. You will be a monster to them. Or will you become the monster and let them think you the angel? Will you spy and serve the Dark Lord or let everyone think that you did anyway while you rot in Azkaban and relive this moment and the others to come until your life is worthless even to you?_

“What was there to be gained by fighting the most evil wizard who has ever existed?” Black cried in disbelief and fury, the same murderous fury that had nearly killed Severus Snape eighteen years ago in this very place. “Only innocent lives, Peter!” _You would never know if we let your mother live after all you went through to save her._

“You don’t understand!” Peter whined desperately. “He would have killed me, Sirius!”

            “THEN YOU SHOULD HAVE DIED!” Black roared over him. _Tell me, would your friends want you to be noble? I suppose you could be thinking that now._ “

            DIED RATHER THAN BETRAY YOUR FRIENDS, AS WE WOULD HAVE DONE FOR YOU!”

            _So do you see, yet, what little good your friends will do for you in the end?  Now and every time that you really need them they can do nothing for you.  Why suffer so much for those who would not do the same for you?  Who would abandon you in your time of need?  Why let your mother die and yourself suffer?  For those who belittle you, exclude you, ignore you?  Who would forget you and not even miss you?  For those who can offer you nothing?_

“You should have realized,” Lupin said quietly, “If Voldemort didn’t kill you, we would. Goodbye, Peter.”

            So it was to be Remus Lupin’s voice that was the last thing that he heard. And the last thing that he thought was the voice of that Death Eater and that choice that had led him to this end. _You would live doubting and wondering and torturing yourself and in a prison of your memory of this moment and this choice. And do you know, Wormtail, what you will see even more often? The look on your friends faces._ In this terrible moment that he thought was his last, Peter realized that this curse would have been his future no matter what choice he had made on that fateful day.  Even if he had done everything that they asked of him now.

            “NO!” Harry suddenly yelled. “You can’t kill him.”

            Peter couldn’t even see anymore. “Harry, this piece of vermin is the reason that you have no parents! This cringing bit of filth would have seen you die too, without turning a hair. You heard him. His own stinking skin meant more to him than your whole family!” _What about virtue and honor and loyalty?  What of them?  Can you honestly say that you do not miss what this cost you?_ This was a very different voice in his head. Marissa Fletcher. That was almost more unbearable.

            “I know, we’ll take him up to the castle. We’ll hand him over to the Dementors. He can go to Azkaban … just don’t kill him.” _If you choose your mother's hands, then you will join us. Only fair, as we have saved you from Azkaban._

So the next generation was better than his predecessors.  So Harry had more compassion than his parents or any of his friends.  Even the much lauded “infinite” compassion of Fletcher hadn’t stopped her from launching out at him, lunging forward in an attempt to kill him or at least hurt him.  Her much more war-like fellows certainly hadn’t paused for a second.  Thank goodness, the boy was too weak to follow through with it.

            The next thing that really penetrated his tortured mind were the words of Harry Potter, “He can go to Azkaban. If anyone deserves that place, he does.” _You will deserve your fate to them._ Then it was that Peter finally, at last, understood the great trick of the Dark Lord. He finally understood the great deception that had been practiced on him. They had threatened him with everyone thinking that he was worthy of Azkaban, that he deserved it. Now, years down the road with his soul damned to hell and everything that had once been good about him gone, he really did deserve it. His friends were all looking at him in the way that he had feared all those year ago. And the worst part was, that he finally, at last, deserved Azkaban after all.

            He was no longer invisible.  But he was nothing to them all the same.

            He was finally utterly alone. _Why, Peter?  Why didn’t you come to us?  We could have helped you.  We still can.  It’s not too late._ Fletcher’s voice in his head was torture because her words could not be more untrue.  He had killed her for daring to speak such lies to him.  No, he had no one to whom he could turn.  He was alone, and he deserved to go to Azkaban, the fate that he had damned himself to avoid.


	7. Mundungus: The Reason I Hate You

Disclaimer: On top of not owning Harry Potter (duh), I also don't own Les Miserables from which the song "Castle on a Cloud" comes.  The musical was written by Alain Boublib, Claude-Michel Schonberg, and Herbert Kretzmer based on the book by Victor Hugo.   


**Chapter Six**

**The Reason I Hate You**

 

_In your eyes, I am a reminder._

            Mundungus slowly walked forward with the letter in his hand.  He couldn’t help shuffling from foot to foot, convinced in his six year old heart that he would be in trouble with his sister.  He was certain that he would be, at least initially, thought a liar by her when he tried to tell her the story of the owl who had been pecking at the front door in its attempt to get in and had finally dropped the letter on the doormat.

            “Whatcha got there, Gus?” his sister asked when she spotted him.  She smiled encouragingly when she saw that he was nervous.  In later years, he would recognize it as a wary look of amusement rather than an open, encouraging smile.

            “A letter,” he told her honestly, his voice of course betraying that there was more to it than that.  He had mastered many of the arts of deception, a surprising number for a six-year-old even under the tutelage of a talented ten-year-old sister, but his voice was still not under his firm control.  Ironically, it was when he was telling the truth – or rather, part of it – that he had the most trouble sounding truthful.

            His sister’s lips twitched briefly into a smile before settling back into a more serious expression.  She was still a novice conman herself, however much early potential she showed.  “Who’s writing to you, Gus?” she asked, and nothing in her voice betrayed more than innocent curiosity.

            “Nobody,” Gus answered, shuffling his feet again.

            “Really?” she cried in surprise.  “My goodness, how in the world did that letter appear?  It must have come from somebody.”

            “It came from an owl,” he told her honestly.

            “An owl?” she echoed, sounding surprised but credulous.  “What in the world is an owl writing to you about?”

            “An owl’s not writing to me,” Gus tried to tell her.

            “No?  Then whatever does that envelope contain?  If we open it, will we hear hooting?  Is it a magic letter?”  The housekeeper and cook, who had been listening throughout this exchange, started chuckling as she swooped up the empty plate from in front of the girl whose composure had not broken.

            “I mean they didn’t write to _me_ ,” Gus tried to tell her plainly enough that she couldn’t deliberately misunderstand yet again.  “It’s for you.”

            “An owl’s writing to me?” his sister replied in surprise, plucking the letter out of his outstretched hands.

            “I don’t know who sent it!” he cried in protest and mild frustration.  “An owl just brought it.”

            “Oh, well, that is unusual,” she replied, examining the thick parchment envelope.  “Do you know of anyone who owns an owl?”

            “Apparently whoever sent it does,” Gus almost snapped, “because I saw it deliver the letter.”  He looked up at his smiling sister and the skeptical housekeeper.  They were both convinced that he was kidding.  He wasn’t this time!

            “Well, open the letter, Miss Marissa,” the housekeeper said, coming over to watch the scene unfold.  “All of your questions for poor Master Mundungus can be easily cleared up by simply opening the letter.”

            So his sister turned over the letter and cracked the giant “H” wax seal.  And their lives changed.

 

*~*~*

 

            A whole new world had exploded into theirs.  Magic and merpeople.  Wizards and wands.  Bedknobs and broomsticks.  Hogwarts and hippogriffs.  Quills and Quidditch.  Charms and Castles.   Newts, frogs, and new friends.

            And Marissa had loved every minute of it.  She loved the whole world from the prejudiced Ministry of Magic to the stratified house system at Hogwarts.  From the bigoted Slytherins to the foolhardy Gryffindors to the snooty Ravenclaws to the naïve Hufflepuffs.  She loved them.  All of them.  She went among first years drying eyes and pulling Sickles out of ears and telling wondrous stories about magic to homesick Muggleborns.  She spent hours sitting there making them love the magical world almost as much as she did.  Even when the Dark Lord came on the scene, she was not swayed.  She stayed to fight and die and sacrifice things worth more than her life to save the wizarding world and all those in it – because she loved them beyond all reason.

            So where were they?  Why was this church empty?  Not even the obligatory hangers-on to any political death, any victim under the Dark Mark.

            Not even her friends had come.  Not even the great Lily and James Potter.  Not even Sirius Black.  Not even Peter Pettigrew.  Just him and her husband/killer and Severus bloody Snape and a priest.  That was all.  Arguably the most popular and beloved student in the history of Hogwarts a little more than four years ago.  And three bloody people came to her funeral.

            Three.

            Three people.

            Where the hell was the magical world she loved so much?  Where were the people that she had sacrificed so much for?  Where were all the people who had loved her?  Whose lives she had touched?  Where were Lizzie and Gideon Prewett who owed their marriage to her meddling?  Where was Alice Longbottom whom she had talked down off a ledge in sixth year when Frank dumped her the first time?

            Where were Lily and James and Sirius and Peter?  Where were the people she had come back to England to see?

            That was what Marissa had never understood.  She loved the wizarding world, but it didn’t give a damn about her.

            So the priest could drone on and on about what a wonderful person she was.  Her husband could sit there making excuse after excuse for all of the pathetic rejects who wouldn’t be with him in his hour of need.  Severus Snape had it right.  He had said something derogatory, almost insulting enough for her furious brother, about her group for not showing up when he came in to see the empty church.  Damn straight.

            When the funeral was over, since there seemed little need for a procession out to the cemetery with pall bearers and great pomp, the three men lingered.  Gus sat under the statue of the Virgin Mary seething about the lack of people here for such a woman as his sister.

            Snape lurked towards the back where he had sat grumpily the entire service.  Her husband stood over the casket, preventing the funeral directors from coming to close and claim the coffin and the priest from moving this small funeral out of his church.  Who would have thought such a poorly attended service would take up so much time?  With each of the three men lingering moodily and putting off all attempts at comfort and conversation, even with each other.

            Finally, Snape moved to the front of the church very slowly.  He looked like a cornered vampire around all of these crucifixes.  He walked up and stood beside Marissa’s husband.  Mundungus looked up at these two men who had loved his sister, perhaps even as much as he did.  But he doubted anyone could ever do that.  She had raised him, protected him, saved him and loved him unconditionally.  She was amazing.

            She deserved better than the two men who had loved her.  But then, on reflection, he shouldn’t have been too hard on Snape, or even her husband.  After all, no one could give her what she deserved.

 

*~*~*

 

            With such a reward for sneaking into Hogwarts for a second time, was it a surprised to anyone that Mundungus Fletcher snuck out on the first Hogsmeade weekend of the year?  The problem was that he, as a Hufflepuff, hadn’t been able to see his sister and her group of friends leave their common room.  So he weaved his way cautiously through the crowd, attaching himself to some third year Ravenclaws that he hadn’t met yet, looking for her.

            Her blonde curly hair was distinctive enough.  Why was he having such a hard time finding her?  He started to panic when the other students quickly dispersed in a hundred different directions upon reaching the main street.

            Mundungus was just beginning to truly panic when he saw her.  Or, at least, he thought it was her at first.  He squinted, trying to see which of the boys that she had introduced him to had his arm around her.  She hadn’t said that she was dating any of them…

            It had to be Potter.  They were cousins, after all, right?  It wasn’t unusual to put your arm around one of your cousins –

            HE KISSED HER!

            Not long or anything, just a quick peck on the lips, but STILL!  On the LIPS!

            Mundungus barely remembered to stay out of sight as he ran after them.  When he was close enough to hear them talking he listened with pounding ears for the name of the boy who must now die.  A slow, painful death.  By ninjas.  And fireballs.  And rusty knives.  Not that the rust on the knives mattered unless you survived.  It’s not like cadavers cared if they got an infection from the wounds that killed them.  Yes, that was it.  Ninjas with rusty knives and fire that didn’t kill him outright but left him for the painful infection.  That was perfect.

            And it looked as if the pub that they ducked into could have provided Mundungus with his specific assassins.  What was he thinking taking a girl like Riss to that seedy bar?

            He followed them inside and hung back in the shadows.  At first it appeared to be okay.  They were just talking.  He was even  laughing at her jokes – not that that was a testament to his good taste or anything.  He’d be an idiot if he didn’t.  Riss was hilarious.  Even when she was telling her canned jokes.  Her laugh was infectious.  He was pale and scrawny and Mundungus almost felt bad about the rusty-knife-bearing-fire-wielding ninjas that would have to disembowel him and leave him to a slow, torturous death.  He didn’t look like he was up to strong gust of wind, much less a battle for his life.  Oh well, it wasn’t as if Mundungus had a choice.  And he was a wizard, so he was probably more than he appeared.  Probably still not a match for rusty-knife-bearing-fire-wielding ninjas, though.  And like Mundungus said before, it was almost too bad because he seemed like an all right guy.

            Right up until the moment that he put his hand on Marissa’s thigh.  She arched her eyebrow at him, mostly playfully.  Although he withdrew his attempt to feel her up under the table – obviously the reason he had chosen this seedy place rather than the more respectable Three Broomsticks – Mundungus was far from satisfied.

            Forget the rusty-knife-bearing-fire-wielding ninjas.  He didn’t have time to wait for a pack of them to appear.  He launched himself forward with a wild cry and leapt on top of the boy who had dared to touch his sister.  He bore the shocked older boy to the ground and had taken his wand before he could properly respond.

            It was quite a spectacle to see a fifteen-year-old boy trying to fend off the mostly ineffectual punches of a ten-year-old intent on defending his sister’s honor.  It was entertaining until Severus Snape managed to get hold of his girlfriend’s brother and keep him from attacking.  That’s when Mundungus Fletcher’s accidental magic exploded in the bar.

            Rusty knives and fireballs sprang into existence all around the room, but they either needed no ninjas to wield them or the ninjas were invisible.  They also did not possess any prejudice for attacking only Severus Snape.  They seemed interested, instead, in causing as much mayhem as possible.  The patrons were ducking and screaming and fleeing the bar in droves.  The bartender was furious but having too much trouble for the moment with the rusty knife knocking all of his firewhiskey bottles off of the shelves.

            Only Marissa and Mundungus had immunity from the fireballs and rusty knives.  As her boyfriend used his wand to fend off the attackers, she simply stared at her brother with fire in her eyes.  “Gus,” she said seriously, her tone a not-so-subtle warning.

            “Sorry,” he mumbled in embarrassment.

            “ _Finite Incantatem!_ ” she cried, spreading her arms wide.  The knives clattered, harmless, to the floor and the fireballs cindered ineffectually into ashes which fell in piles on the filthy floor.  She glared at him for a long moment.  When he ducked his head in shame, she allowed the smile that had been threatening to erupt burst onto her face.  “That was an impressive bit of magic, actually,” she told her brother.  Severus Snape just stared at her in mild horror.

            That was when the owner took action.  After throwing all three out, he banned them from the Hog’s Head for life.

            They all dared to defy his decree eventually.  Only Severus Snape, who came once to spy on the meeting of Sybill Trelawney and Albus Dumbledore, was caught doing so.  He had been discovered in the hall before the prophecy was finished and thrown out of the dingy bar at once, for the second time in his life.  Before another legion of rusty knives and fireballs destroyed the place.

 

*~*~*

 

            “Why the hell did you bring her back here?” Severus Snape demanded of her husband as they both stood over the body of Marissa.  Mundungus listened to their conversation, seeing the way that neither of them could take their eyes off of the body of his sister.

            “She wanted the chance to say goodbye to our friends,” Marissa’s husband said stiffly, obviously tremendously frustrated by the intrusion but unable to banish his wife’s liberator in good conscience.

            “Stupid,” Snape grunted.  “She was always stupid.  My compliments for not throttling her years before now.”

            “Excuse me?” her husband demanded.  The start at Snape’s unnecessary phrasing was severe for all three men.

            “Did you fancy that you were some object of jealousy for me?” Snape was the first to recover.  “Hardly.  Oh, I may have been dismayed by her choice, upset by her outright rejection, but we never would have brought each other anything but misery.  Our relationship was nothing but pure torture.  That is all that she ever brought me.”

            “You can’t pretend, after what you risked to save her, that she meant nothing to you,” her husband said with surprising ferocity.  Also unfortunate ferocity, considering the marks and wounds that had had to be removed from her body before it was presentable.

            “Oh, she was undoubtedly the love of my life,” Snape replied almost nonchalantly, if not for the longing in his eyes, “and I might even be the love of hers.  No offence, but you of all people must have suspected that at times.  But she was infuriating and ridiculous.  My compliments for managing to live with her for so long.”

            “I think that you had better go,” her husband said stiffly.

            “I shouldn’t have come at all,” Snape said, not moving an inch.  Then Mundungus understood why he had come and why he insisted on talking that way of his sister.  He had lost her before now.  Degrading her and the life that they might have shared in a different world had gotten him through losing her once.  Who was to claim that it would not help dealing with her death?

            But it did not make Snape able to turn around and leave.  It did not keep him from lingering to take his last look at Marissa Fletcher.  “But, you see,” Snape said, as if to explain his reluctance to go, “it never really mattered in the end that she was an insane flibbertigibbet who worshipped the ground that Potter walked on or even that you were her husband, and obviously the only man who could have been her husband.  Because I could never resist her.  I could never be rid of her.  Your wife, you must have noticed, had a way of getting under the skin, like some infernal parasite.”

            “That would plague you the rest of your days,” her husband finished, looking up at Severus Snape for the first time since the conversation began.  It was another long moment before Snape did the same.  Their eyes met for but a moment, then Snape whirled on his heel and walked swiftly out of the church without another word.

            Leaving Mundungus Fletcher alone with his sister’s husband and killer.

 

*~*~*

 

            Marissa, not for the first time in her life, had miscalculated.  She did not do it often, per se, but she was certainly not immune to social blunders.  She left her brother and boyfriend alone on Christmas morning as she went to hurry along the cider that Lily, James and Sirius were preparing in the kitchen.  The merry sounds echoing from that room, in particular Peter’s shrill demands that everyone stay away from the cookie dough that he was painstakingly preparing, were the only sound for a very long time.

            “I see you gave her a ring,” Mundungus finally said.  His tone was neither entirely hostile nor particularly inviting.  Even after a year of his sister dating him and two years of him giving her endlessly attentive care, Mundungus was not quite used to his sister’s boyfriend and her dependence on him.

            “Actually, no,” the young man replied to his apparently soon-to-be brother-in-law, “she got tired of me chickening out and just grabbed the ring out of my pocket.  She put it on and didn’t say anything else about it.”

            “Before or after she found out that she relapsed?”

            “Before,” her fiancée clarified, “but it wouldn’t have changed anything.  Not on my end, except that she probably would have had to wait for me to get up the courage.”

            “You would have proposed to a woman that you knew would probably die soon?” Mundungus demanded, more like a potential father-in-law than brother-in-law.

            “Nothing could have checked my desire to marry Marissa,” her fiancée said stoutly.  “I love her.”

            “That’s a good start,” Mundungus said, nodding gruffly.  It was an awkward pose for him, especially with one of the boys that he had worshipped throughout their time at Hogwarts.  He had often thought that they were the only four boys (excluding James when he found out about their close blood relation) that he would approve of for his sister.  The reality of her impending marriage, however, was very different.  Instead of seeing this boy as someone who would make Marissa a good match and as worthy as possible a husband, in the face of the reality of marriage he was set up as a rival for her affection.

            And he hadn’t had the courage to ask her himself.  That was a bad sign in that it showed him to lack some of the courage that would be desperately needed both to sustain her during her illness and protect her from the War which had fully engulfed the wizarding world.  It was a good sign in that it showed that he realized that he was not really good enough for her.  Then again, no one was.

            “She seems to want to marry you,” Mundungus allowed a moment later.

            “I’m as confused as you are,” her fiancée replied, “but I’m not going to question it.  I’m too afraid that it will vanish.”

            “She’s more constant than that.”

            “I know.”

            “Good.”

            They seemed in danger of lapsing into silence again when her fiancée burst out, quite unexpectedly, with, “Do you want me to adopt you too?”

            “Excuse me?” Mundungus asked, perfectly surprised.

            “Well, as my wife will be your legal guardian, I thought that it might be better if I was too,” her future husband said.  Mundungus could only stare at him.  “Then if something happens to her before you’re of age, you would still have a place to go.”

            “Nothing’s going to happen to her,” Mundungus said fiercely, ignoring everything else about what had just been said.

            “I just thought that it would be better if she knew that I could take care of you, if anything should ever happen,” her future husband said.  “She worries about you far more than she probably should.  I don’t want her to think that you’ll be shipped off to an orphanage if something happens to her.”

            “It won’t.”

            “If it’s in my power to stop it, it won’t,” her future husband agreed.  “This is more for her peace of mind.”

            “Well,” Mundungus mumbled, completely taken aback by the offer and the argument.  “I suppose that wouldn’t be too bad of an idea then.”  A third silence threatened to engulf them, nearly as awkward as the first.  Luckily, Mundungus quipped, “You’re not just trying to get your grubby little hands on my fortune, are you?”

            Her fiancée laughed, long and hard. “Yes, that’s precisely my motive for marrying into your family,” he said, his sides heaving.  “Your money.”

            “We do have quite a bit,” Mundungus pointed out.

            “As do I,” her fiancée added.

            “I bet we have more,” Mundungus said, just to sound young and petulant.

            “You boys,” Marissa said as she entered, shaking her head, “always fighting over who has the biggest – well, anything, I suppose.  He asked your permission yet, Gus?”

            “I had to take matters into my own hands, but yes,” Mundungus told her.

            “Me too.  Even for the things he wants most, no initiative,” Marissa said, shaking her head at her fiancée even as she plopped down on his lap.

 

*~*~*

 

            Mundungus Fletcher’s blood ran cold when he saw Sprout standing in the door.  Professor McGonagall fell silent mid-spell.  The whole class swiveled around in their desks.  Mundungus stayed still.  He had caught a glimpse of her in the doorframe.  He did not have to turn.  That glimpse was all that he wanted to see.

            “Excuse me, Professor McGonagall,” Professor Sprout said, sounding sad and very quiet.  “I need to bring Mr. Fletcher to the Headmaster’s office.”  This was grimmer than any prank gone wrong.  This meeting would be worse than the one with Slughorn after he had been discovered at Hogwarts for the second time, the time when everything could have been ruined forever.

            Mundungus followed mutely.  He could practically hear Marissa scolding him about that, “Never be silent and guilty when they’re leading you into the Interrogation Room.  Be inquisitive, glad to be out of class if applicable, and cheerful.  You did nothing wrong, remember?”  Mundungus smiled for a very brief moment.  Few prefects taught students, even their younger brothers, how to get out of trouble.  Professor Sprout was silent too.  She did not seem to be able to find anything to say.  She had had to break the news to too many students over the past few years, but how could she tell this poor, abused, fragile boy that his sister and mother figure and best friend and the only person that he really trusted had been killed?  The day after he had left her to come back to school?

            Mundungus, however, let out a sigh of relief when he saw that Remus Lupin was not in Dumbledore’s office.  Perhaps, then, it was only something about his new class situation.   Sprout had probably just leapt to conclusions.  That was the only reason she looked so grim.  Remus would have come if she had died, or even collapsed or something.  His heart gave something of a twist just at the thought.

            But Dumbledore looked so grim and sad and almost defeated.  It cut into Mundungus’s relief.

            And soon he had none at all.  Mundungus vaguely remembered how Dumbledore told him.  It wasn’t as if he blocked it out.  But there was buzzing and emotional shutting down.  He didn’t remember any of it too specifically except that he would never forget a second of it.

            “Where’s Remus?” was all that he said.

            “At the Ministry.  He wanted to be here, but we didn’t want to delay and we don’t know how long the Aurors will detain him.”

            “Aurors?”

            “Well, Mr. Fletcher, it seems that the Death Eaters…they…” Mundungus had never seen Dumbledore stumble over his word before.  “They didn’t precisely attack the house.  They…let your brother-in-law out of the shack he was using to contain himself.”

            “He killed her?” Mundungus whispered, horrified and hoarse.

            “I wouldn’t say it quite like that,” Dumbledore replied, not convincingly or confidently.  He seemed shattered and jaded.  It soothed Mundungus as much as anything could at such a moment.  Even Dumbledore, who had seen more death than anyone else over the past few years and felt every loss deeply, did not know quite how to handle the death of Marissa Lupin.  It was not political, though it masqueraded as such.  It was not military, though she was a soldier.  It was simply cruel.

            “When do you think they’ll let him go?”  
            “Very soon, Mr. Fletcher.”

 

*~*~*

 

            “Father Michael wants to do the graveside service,” Marissa’s husband told him.

            Mundungus did not move.  He simply sat perfectly still staring straight ahead.  He did not glance at his sister’s husband.  “Mundungus-“

            “I heard you,” he cut him off.  He still did not move.

            Marissa’s husband waited for a minute or so.  “Gus-“

            “Don’t call me ‘Gus,’” he said coldly, not looking at him.  “Only one person was allowed to call me ‘Gus.’  And she was not you.”

            There was another moment, then, “Mundungus-“

            “Why did you have to bring her back?”  If he hadn’t caught it before, the hostility was now crystal clear.  Even he could not pretend that he didn’t notice it.  “Why couldn’t you have a spine for once in your life?”

            “Mundungus-“

            “What happened when I left that room?  Did she just bat her pretty little eyes at you and you caved or did she at least have to play the ‘I’m dying’ card?”

            “Mundungus, don’t say something that you’re going to regret –“

            “I don’t regret it!” Mundungus shouted at him, rising to his feet and turning to face him.

            “- in the middle of your sister’s funeral!” her husband finished, yelling over him.

            “Middle of her _what_ now?” Mundungus retorted snidely.  “Funeral?  You call this a funeral?  Please tell me that you didn’t bring her back to her death for people who don’t even have the decency to show up to her funeral!”  Of course, he knew already that that was exactly what had happened, but that was what Mundungus could actually _say_.  The other bit of Remus’s guilt was something that even in his grief and rage he could never say to his brother-in-law.

            “She wanted to see them at least one more time,” her husband defended himself.  Mundungus missed how guilty and broken he already sounded.  He knew the masquerade that was going on.

            “You mean you _did?_ ” Mundungus exclaimed, furiously.  “You shortened her life for _them?_   Where the hell are they, Remus?  Why didn’t they have the decency  to come?  This empty church is what we gave up months of her life for?  _Months,_ Remus.  Bloody months we could have had with her.  For people who didn’t even come today.  Why?”  And it was a very good point, in itself.

            “I don’t know!” her husband shouted back at him, scandalizing the priest as their voices echoed in the large, empty church.  “I don’t know anything anymore!  I don’t know how they could abandon us!  But then I don’t know how they could think we betrayed them, I don’t know how they could distrust us, I don’t know how they could cut us out of their lives!  I can’t conceive of how we got where we are today!”

            “Merlin, what the hell is wrong with you?  Both of you were always like this!” Mundungus screamed.  “What does it _really matter_ that your Hogwarts friendship dissolved in the real world?  I don’t expect Toby and Mary and Sean to be my best friends forever!  We’ll work different places, we’ll live different places and we won’t act like the world must be coming to an end if we grow apart!”

            “The Marauders weren’t like that!  We meant something to each other!  Something big, something that doesn’t come around for most people even once in a lifetime!” 

            With that, Mundungus wanted to strangle his sister’s husband.  “Something that was _over_ long before you stopped fighting for it!  They would not have done half of what you’ve done for them for you!  They won’t even _come to her funeral._   What is your insane loyalty to them?” Mundungus vaguely noticed that they had moved into the aisle and were ranging up and down the rows of pews as they fought.

            The priest was following them, horrified and invisible to both of them.

            “We couldn’t give up on them!”

            “No, _she_ couldn’t give up on them!” Mundungus corrected.  “She was insane and romantic and sentimental and unrealistic and that’s her fucking prerogative because that’s who she’s always been!  You’re the pessimist, realistic one who’s not supposed to let her get herself killed on some damned fool _hopeless_ crusade!  Why did you choose _now_ to let her control you when this was the moment to save her?”

            “We thought we were protected!  You know the precautions we were taking-“

            “Which brilliantly included telling two men, at least one of whom we know has betrayed all of us!  Yes, I can’t think of a safer situation!”

            There was a ringing silence, during which Mundungus could feel the knowledge coming upon him.  “No,” he whispered.  “That’s what happened isn’t it?” he demanded.  “You had both of them come to see her.  So she could find out who had betrayed them; she deliberately put herself in danger when you wouldn’t be able to help her.”

            Her husband did not attempt to deny it in the ringing silence that followed.

            “So, either Peter Pettigrew tripped the latch and barricaded himself in your house or Sirius Black sent Death Eaters to finish the job without him,” Mundungus said quietly.  “You think they sent Malfoy?  He would certainly have loved the twist of making you her killer.  And thus ended Marissa Fletcher.”

            “Dung-“

 

_In your eyes, I wanted to see what she saw in you and them.  I wanted you to look me in the eyes and show me that what she had died for was worth it.  That would have almost been enough for me to forgive you – or at least to find a way to live with you so I wouldn’t have to be alone.  But it wasn’t there, and I knew that there would never be anything but guilt in your eyes when you looked at me._

 

            “You know,” Mundungus said over him, his mouth twisting into a wry smile that made him look shockingly like his sister, “I really had you guys figured wrong.  I thought when I met Lily and James and Sirius that they were the most arrogant, conceited, big-headed people in the world.  But no, it’s the two of you!”

            “Mundungus, stop it,” her husband was trying to handle him.  Like he should have done with her days ago.

            “You thought that she could turn the man who betrayed _Lily and James Potter_ with – what?  A half hour’s chat by the deathbed?  I mean, she was amazing but what were you thinking?”

            “It’s what she’s been doing for years, she couldn’t turn away when it was our friends at stake-“

            “Regulus Black is not the former best friend who betrayed Lily and James bloody Potter!” Mundungus roared over him, shrugging off the priest who tried to grab his arm, presumably to force him out of the church.  “Merlin!  Are you the only two people in the wizarding world who don’t understand the massive tidal wave of darkness and death and despair that has engulfed our entire world?  And _you can’t fix it._   You can’t turn the tide.  The Gryffindor Six isn’t enough.  You are not enough.  You threw her life away for _nothing._ ”

            Shrugging off the priest, Mundungus turned and walked out of the doors with one last backward glance at his sister’s husband.  “And maybe the wizarding world’s not worth saving.  It can’t even come to her bloody funeral.”  Then he was gone, leaving the indignant priest to hurry her husband out of the church behind him.

            Just before getting into the car that they had driven from the house, Mundungus looked back to see Marissa’s husband take one of the blue books that his group had given her out of the pocket of his jacket and stare at it for a long moment, as if deciding what he would do with it.

            Mundungus didn’t give a damn.  Marissa was dead.  And her husband could go to hell for all he cared.

 

*~*~*

 

            Mundungus felt the distinct need to flee.  “Don’t you dare walk out that door, Mundungus Fletcher,” Marissa ordered, sounding quite like his mother, at least how he imagined she would sound.

            He stopped of course.  There was a long pause during which his sister faced him down, and he stubbornly looked in any other direction.

            When he finally couldn’t take the silence any more he demanded, “What is this room?” just like the surly teenager he would fully grow into in a few years.

            “Sirius found it,” Marissa replied, “and I found him in it a few years later.”

            “Sirius doesn’t look like someone who plays,” Mundungus grunted, nodding unnecessarily at the grand piano that was the only interesting feature of the room.

            “Gus,” Marissa said sternly, “shut up.”  She sighed, and added, “All right,  no preamble.  Would you come out, guys?”  The last part was louder, obviously meant to carry to the next room.  Mundungus was half-expecting something along the lines of clowns or circus freaks, but it was only Sirius and Lily.  Mundungus would have almost rather put up with a watermelon juggling contortionist right now.  Why did Marissa insist that this group be present whenever she wanted to talk to him about her illness?  Why was she putting them on the same level as her family?

            “I asked them to learn this song that Mom sang to me when I was little,” Marissa explained.  Well, Marissa couldn’t carry a tune in a bucket, so it made a sort of sense, but Mundungus didn’t want to hear it anyway.

            Not hearing his unspoken thoughts, Sirius sat down at the piano and Lily stood just behind him so that she could, presumably, look at the words.  Then Sirius started to play.

            “It sounds like a music box,” Mundungus said gruffly.

            “Sh,” Marissa replied firmly.  It was true though.  The song was more complex and had more depth of course, and a wider range, but the feeling was the same.  It was sweet, twinkling and innocent, even naïve.  When Lily started to sing, her rich, warm voice seemed out of place.  She sounded like a mother singing to her daughter rather than a little girl singing to herself.  That was probably the way that Marissa remembered it, however, even if the song wasn’t written that way.

            From what he could remember, the lyrics of the song read:

 

_There is a castle on a cloud._

_I like to go there in my sleep._

_Aren’t any floors for me to sweep,_

_Not in my castle on a cloud._

_There is a room that’s full of toys._

_There are a hundred boys and girls._

_Nobody shouts or talks too loud,_

_Not in my castle on a cloud._

_There is a lady all in white,_

_Holds me and sings a lullaby._

_She’s nice to see and she’s soft to touch._

_She says, Cosette, I love you very much._

_I know a place where no one’s lost._

_I know a place where no one cries._

_Crying at all is not allowed,_

_Not in my castle on a cloud._

 

            When the final note had faded, Mundungus found that Marissa had walked until she was in front of him, only a few feet away.  “I used to wonder, when I was little, if mom would ever come some night and sweep me away to this magical place.  When I got my Hogwarts letter a part of me thought that that was exactly what had happened.

            “I know that I’ve made Hogwarts a place like that for you, coming home with stories of everything that’s good and none of the bad.  I made Hogwarts a perfect dream for you the way this castle in the clouds was for me.  Especially when I began to fear that the home I was leaving and you were trapped inside had become a nightmare, I wanted you to have a beautiful dream.

            “But Hogwarts isn’t a castle in the clouds.  It’s a castle in the middle of one of the most dangerous forests in Britain.  For every ghost like Nearly-Headless Nick and the Fat Friar there’s a Bloody Baron.  For every trick stair, there’s a Whomping Willow.  The pretty lake is fathoms deep and filled with treacherous monsters.  The dungeons didn’t always house only potions classrooms.  For good and for bad, Hogwarts is a real place.  In some ways, it makes it better than any dreamworld in the clouds, because we can really go here, but it certainly isn’t a place where no one cries.  Darkness gets in the brightest place, every object casts a shadow.”

            Mundungus wasn’t sure at which point during her simple, yet earnest speech he had started crying.  When she finished, he let out a sob and she immediately crushed him into a hug.  “I don’t want – it’s not fair –“

            “No, it isn’t,” she said firmly.  She pulled back and held his shoulders in order to make eye contact, “but it is going to be okay.  This is not the end of the world.  We can handle this.  We’ll get through it, and then it’ll be over and we can go about our lives, okay?”

            “How can you – but how do you know –“ the sobs were coming fast now and making it hard to speak.

            “I said we’d get out of Dad’s house, and we did, didn’t we?  A full year earlier than we thought possible!  We’ve already gotten through one bad chapter of our lives, we can get through this one.  And that’s all this is, Gus.  A bad chapter of our lives.  It is not the end.  We’re still in the prologue.”

            “I’m still scared,” Mundungus admitted, fearing in his twelve year old heart that his sister would be mad at him.

            “So am I,” she admitted, and he could see through the tear in his eyes that she was crying too.  “It’s okay to be scared, it’s just not okay to give up hope, all right?”

 

*~*~*

Gus’s Epilogue

*~*~*

 

            The paperwork never went through.  They hadn’t wanted to admit its necessity or its urgency, even when the threat was upon them.  So there was no Ministry to question it when Mundungus Fletcher sent a reply to Remus Lupin that he would not be visiting him for the holidays.  There was no surprise when instead of living with his sister’s husband, Mundungus Fletcher let an apartment upon graduating from Hogwarts.

            There was considerably greater consternation over the drastic change in both and their utter separation from each other among their remaining friends.  But Remus Lupin and Mundungus Fletcher had removed themselves far from the friends who would have helped them reunite.

            It hurt too much to see each other.

            Truthfully, Mundungus himself freaked people out.  He was the moodiest, grouchiest, sleaziest Hufflepuff imaginable.  He went from mostly benign prankster to the Hogwarts bookie in two weeks flat.  He went from a playfully disruptive presence in class to a surly destructive one.  He turned his back on all who tried to reach out to him, even Toby and Mary and Sean.  Especially Toby and Mary and Sean.  He had seen what Hogwarts friends could be depended on for.

            They thought it grief.  They thought it anger.  They thought it Mundungus’s true nature without his sister’s influence.  They all missed it.  They had no legal guardian to ask about it.  They missed what he would have seen.

            They missed his hatred of them.

            Mundungus had a very skewed sense of right and wrong, as Molly Weasley would be quite eager to point out years later. He had a deep-seated devotion to justice, but he defined justice far too harshly for most people. The way that he saw it, the entire wizarding world was at fault for the murder of his sister. Everyone. From Voldemort who had ordered the killing and the Death Eaters who had carried it out, to the weakling pure-blood and half-bloods who hadn't stood up to stop him, to the Ministry which hadn't cared enough about her to try to protect her even after she had been personally threatened by You-Know-Who, to Albus Dumbledore who hadn't thought to protect her when she exceeded her usefulness to him. And, of course, Remus Lupin. Most of all and least of all, Remus Lupin.

            Mundungus Fletcher blamed the entire wizarding world, so the entire wizarding world must pay. He had decided, after several months of observation at Hogwarts, that the only way to truly hurt the ancient, heartless group was through their pocketbooks. That was when Mundungus Fletcher went from magician to thief.

            When he graduated, he set out to cheat as much as possible from as many as possible. The ruin of the family fortune of the Weasleys, the Gorings, the Lupins, and the Carrows were his masterpieces. The Princes had also fallen on hard times. Only the Gorings and Carrows had been Death Eaters, of course, and Mariella Goring did not deserve the pauper's fate she had been condemned to by any stretch of the imagination. Or rather, by the stretch of any normal imagination. One trait that Mundungus did share with his sister was a larger than normal imagination. The Weasleys who hid their large family from the War were as guilty, in his mind, as those who had arranged the death of Marissa Fletcher. Remus Lupin was obvious. He had been disinherited on Mundungus's discovery. With no male heir eligible to inherit, the ancient estate was visibly dwindling.  He had also ensured that none of Marissa’s money went to her husband.  Her killer hadn’t contested that point.

            In fact, it was more than five years after Marissa’s funeral before the two men met again.

 

*~*~*

 

            A man pushed his messy, silvering brown hair back from his face. He blinked and looked around, trying to make his eyes focus on the scene in front of him. It was his ratty kitchen that eventually became clear in front of him. He wondered occasionally why he insisted on keeping it so meticulously clean. It never looked clean. Sure, he could put on a plastic glove, run his finger along any surface in the kitchen, and come away perfectly clean. It still looked dilapidated and grubby, because it was.

            The man massaged a sharp crick in his neck and stretched his shoulders. He suppressed the kind of groan he usually saved for the day after a transformation. When had he fallen asleep? He looked at the glass in the hand that wasn't trying to ease the extreme stiffness that came with sleeping hunched over your kitchen table for several hours.

            "Ah," he said aloud as he saw the amber liquid filling the glass. Getting warily to his feet, he poured the rest of it in the sink. He sighed. She wouldn't have liked him actually drinking it. Then again, if she had been there to lecture him about it, he wouldn't have been tempted.

            He was just putting the bottle away when a very loud crack exploded in his hungover brain. He dropped the bottle and the sharp smell of whiskey filled the room. Sighing heavily, the man waved his wand, muttering a soft, " _Reparo._ " The bottle flew back together, but the whiskey was still all over his "clean" kitchen.

            "Hello, Dung," the man muttered, vanishing the whiskey. The smell lingered. "Dare I say, 'Happy Holidays,' if only for the sake of manners?"

            "Yes, I think that the two of you will get along very well," Mundungus said in a mysterious way that made his companion freeze, it was so close to the way that his sister could sound.

            "Do you have a point, Dung? You must have a point to come here," the man said, still not turning around.

            "You always did pretend that you knew me," Mundungus said in a musing way that broke the other man's heart - it was _exactly_ the way that his sister had sometimes sounded. "How did you know it was me, by the way?"

            "If you'd tried that five years ago, you'd be dead right now," the man said, going to the sink with a tea kettle and pouring water into it. "Other than Death Eaters, you're the only one who would dare to come here on Christmas."

            "You have so much faith in the Ministry then?"

            "I repeat: do you have a point, Dung?"

            "Actually, I have a job for you," Mundungus told him.

            "Refresh my memory, if you would," the other man said, starting to wash the glass with his back still to his brother-in-law. "Were you not the Mundungus Fletcher who figured out that my mother cheated on my father with a Muggle? Thus making me a half-blood and not technically a Lupin? Effectively robbing me of my family fortune? Condemning me to this ratty hole in the wall for the rest of my days? And were not your sentiments, when you owned your triumph over me in a gloating letter, that I deserved worse than to be forever poor?  Destined for destitution from the moment I tore your sister limb from limb.  Those were your almost poetic sentiments, were they not?"

            "It's not for you. It's for a friend," Mundungus replied. "Besides, Hogwarts has got to be better than this, Lupin."

            "You have a friend?" Lupin asked curiously.

            Mundungus smiled slightly. "Interestingly enough, I do."

            "What did you steal from him?" Lupin asked, drying the glass and placing it in the cabinet over the counter.

            "Her, and family fortune, same as you," Mundungus replied immediately. He spoke casually as if speaking of an impressive Quaffle save. "In the form of an insurance paper that got misplaced this time."

            "You'd think that you could afford a better suit," Lupin said somewhat coldly. That was one thing that didn't remind him of Mundungus's sister. She never spoke so casually about hurting people, even if it was only financially. She had broken her fair share of hearts even so.

            “I don't care if the money goes up in flames or comes to me," Mundungus replied with an audible shrug that Lupin could hear with his back to the younger man. Remus snorted. "I don't _object_ if it comes to me," he added with a laugh just like his sister's in his voice.

            Remus froze again. It was too close to Christmas Eve to think of Marissa. It was too close to Christmas Eve for her to not come to mind. Christmas was too near for any of this. It was too close for Marissa Fletcher's brother to be standing in his kitchen no matter what his mission. Lupin could tell that it was killing Mundungus as well.

            "Why are you here, Dung?" Lupin said, letting the torture he was feeling enter his voice.

            "The paperwork has to go through today," he replied. "Or Umbridge will block it from going through at all, and Mariella won't get another shot at her project."

            "Mariella?" Lupin asked softly.

            "Goring," Mundungus replied solemnly.

            "Your only friend," Lupin muttered, shaking his head in slight disbelief.

            "If there's one thing that my father taught me," Mundungus said quietly, "it's that you really can't judge a person by their parents. Would you have ever guessed that Marissa came from that man?"

            "When did you become open-minded?" Lupin muttered.

            "Yes or no, Lupin. She has to know today.  Preferably this moment."

            “What project?”

            “A potion,” Mundungus said softly, “that would have kept you from killing her.”

            Remus Lupin whirled around to face him.

 

_In your eyes, I am her second chance._

_And I blew it._


	8. Lily: The Reason I Believed You

**Chapter Seven**

**The Reason I Believed You**

 

All Hallow’s Eve 1981

            _I am Lily Potter.  I am Lily bloody Evans.  How did I get here?  How did I end up here?  Sitting up in my son’s room, guarding his cradle because I am afraid that Peter Pettigrew – almost a Squib – will come for him.  I am not the kind of Muggleborn to cower before even the most powerful purebloods, much less a Squib.  I swore I would never be like that._

_I also swore that I would never make such a mistake.  I swore that I would always protect my son.  How did I come to put him in such danger?  We all knew that James was the one to watch in that department.  We all knew that James would have him flying a broom before he could handle it, encouraging him to play with our wands and poke through my potions supplies, blowing things up.  We all knew it would be my job to make sure that my son stayed alive under such tutelage._

_I am Lily Potter.  I am Lily Evans._

_I am strong.  I am brilliant.  I am powerful.  I am the most gifted witch in generations.  I am proof that Muggleborns are a match for any of the Old Families.  I am talented.  I am formidable._

_What happened to me?_

_But perhaps this is the same old mistake I’ve always made.  Perhaps nothing has changed.  I never was a good judge of character.  I thought that James Potter was nothing but a selfish jerk.  I thought Petunia and I would reconcile.  I thought she would have agreed to be our Secret Keeper.  I thought Severus Snape would mellow under Marissa’s wing.  I thought that he had corrupted her once, and that she and Remus had turned their backs on us.  I always judged too hastily, too unwisely._

_When I was Lily Evans, I was unbeatable.  Unmatchable.  Because I had Marissa Fletcher.  She was there to correct me.  Everywhere I was weak, she was strong.  I was Lily Evans because she was Marissa Fletcher._

_I am Lily Potter.  You stopped being Marissa Fletcher to me.  But I am still Lily Evans to you.  In your eyes, I am everything that I ever was to you.  In your eyes, nothing had changed, nothing important in the end._

_If only I could see myself the way that I looked in your eyes.  If only I could have seen you clearly.  If only I could have seen at all._

Twelve Hours Earlier

Lily Potter watched as Remus Lupin drew the slip of paper from his pocket, read it briefly, then pulled out his wand and burned it.

            “You needn’t have done that,” Lily said quietly.  “It would have self destructed.”

            “I’d rather that be on my own terms, when possible,” he replied.  They both stood, staring at each other and pulling their cloaks tighter around them to adjust for the drizzle.  They stood on opposite sides of the tract of newly dug earth that currently marked Marissa Lupin’s grave.  “So many things are out of my hands.”

            The ashes from the piece of paper suddenly shown pink, let out a few rays of blue light, and exploded anew, scattering across the freshly dug earth.  “So do you, it seems,” Remus said, sounding mildly amused.

            “We didn’t want someone to rip it in half and circumvent the self-destruct spell,” Lily explained clinically.

            “You mean ‘you’ didn’t want that to happen,” Remus said firmly, but not snappishly.  He sounded like McGonagall correcting a minor point of a difficult spell.  “You don’t expect me to believe that James was involved in that colorful display.”

            “I wanted it to be convincing,” Lily shrugged, “not that it would matter if they did try to salvage the pieces.”

            “I can tell it was hard for you to say ‘I’ rather than ‘we,’” Remus said, neither of them breaking the fixed gaze they had on their companion.  “It’s against your general character.  You pride yourself in going it alone.”

            “Just a habit,” Lily replied, shrugging slightly and looking down.

            “Yes, I suppose you and James are a unit these days,” Remus nodded slightly.

            “Actually,” Lily said quietly, “it’s a habit from Hogwarts, when ‘we’ was always Marissa and me.  Then it was entirely accurate.”

            They were silent for a moment, then Remus looked down.  He stared at the ground for a few seconds as if gathering his emotions, then jerked his head back up to face her again.  “I have to ask,” he demanded, sounding angry, “I have to try to understand, even if I don’t think I’ll ever be able to.”

            “How we could have thought that you-“

            “No,” Remus said impatiently, waving that aside with his hand.  “That I almost understand.  There was evidence certainly not in our favor.  What I want to know is: what could she possibly have _said_ to make you change your mind?”

            Lily must have started, because Remus continued, “I know that’s what she did with that book.  She must have written something in it, some kind of message to you, trusting you or James to deactivate the enchantment – something only you would think to do and probably that only James could do.  All of that I understand, what I don’t understand is what she could have possibly _said_ must less _written_ to convince you of what we couldn’t – for so long…”

            “Marissa and I…for so long we were…”  Lily felt the insufficiency of her explanation.  Even for herself.

            “So were the Marauders, and you had the same past when you decided that she must have betrayed you,” Remus replied, now his voice tinged with a hint of hostility.  “What could she have said to change your mind?  To make you believe her?  Was it because she was dead?”

            “It’s because she finally told me the truth,” Lily said, the words bursting from her purely out of her own desire to know.  But she could feel that they were right.  She looked down again for a moment, uncomfortable and shifting from one foot to the other, “When you two started keeping your secret, we all knew right away.  We knew each other too well for us not to know that you were keeping something – something big – from us.  That was the wedge, the wedge that separated me from my better half, my best friend.  I could feel that she didn’t trust me, that she had secrets from me.  She finally told me what it was.”

            “So is it worth it?” Remus asked.  “You who know everything now, was our sacrifice worth it?  For that matter, was yours?”

            “It’s not over yet, Remus,” she said quietly.  There was a small ping and an owl feather floated to the ground.  “That’s the two minute warning.”

            “So I still only rate a partial inclusion in the Fidelius Charm,” Remus said.

            “We can’t risk bringing someone else into the Charm now,” Lily said.  “It weakens the spell in general especially-“

            “When the thief is already inside the walls,” Remus finished for her.  Lily looked briefly surprised.

            “You and I weren’t exactly strangers,” he reminded her.  “Especially seventh year, when we were the only line of defense in the battle to keep Marissa from overdoing it and hurting herself.”

            “I suppose so,” she said quietly.

            “You can forget a lot of things, given enough time,” Remus told her.  

            Another ping and another owl feather floated to the ground.  “You are protecting yourself – from Peter,” he said, suddenly urgent.

            “We’re taking what steps we can, without…”

            “Best not tell me more?” Remus guessed.

            “I’m sorry, Remus,” she said quietly.  “But if it helps, Marissa thought of that too and included a way to help us.”

            “She loved all of you,” Remus said simply.  “And wanted nothing more than to save you or, saving that, to say goodbye.”

            “I know,” Lily said, “that’s why I’m sorry.”  Lily reached into her pocket and pulled out a tattered piece of rolled up parchment.  She extended it slowly, “James sends his regards.  He said it would mean something to you.”

            Remus slowly reached for it and took it from her hand.  “Tell him thank you.”  Remus’s face seemed to crumble in on itself for a brief moment.  With effort, he reassembled a neutral look on his face as he looked down, on the pretext of studying the invisible map.  A moment later, he looked up in her direction.

            Lily was glad that time had elapsed, and Remus could no longer see, hear or otherwise sense her presence.  Thus invisible, she turned and left the graveyard which held her former best friend, Marissa Lupin.  As she went, a few tears slid silently down her face.

 

Five Hours Earlier

 

            “You want me to take your Invisibility Cloak to Dumbledore?” Peter repeated, staring at the two of them.  “Didn’t you have what you called a ‘terrible row’ with him the last time you met?  You told me that you want a meeting to make up, although I don’t think five minutes will be enough time for that, but is a peace offering like this really necessary?”

            “Well, we thought it would be dangerous to hold a grudge.  Besides, it’s for the good of the Order, and Lily’s the only one going.  And it’s not like we need the Cloak,” James joked with an easy smile.  Lily could only look mildly worried, but that was probably her most convincing expression anyway.  “And Moody was complaining about the poor quality of the Order cloaks at the last meeting.”

            “Your Cloak, James?” Peter said again, his tone dubious.

            “Well,” James flashed another smile, “it is only a loan.”

            “I’d rather have it out of the house too,” Lily added.   “James is certain to leave it lying about-“

            “Darling!  I vehemently protest!” James cried.

            “You always do,” Lily waved him away.  “Then you go right ahead and prove me right.  What if Harry got tangled in it?  Or just wandered off under it?  Do you want to be responsible for that?”

            “Actually, if he could manage that at one,” James said, “I’d just be impressed.”

            “Yeah, I suppose you would,” Lily gave him a mock glare.  “That’s why we’re being generous with the Order while we have no need for an Invisibility Cloak.”

            “That and Sirius complained about the invisible person tripping him up all the time,” James added with a smirk.

            “All right,” Peter said, giving them a quick glance up and down.  How had they never heard that calculating tone?  How had they not seen the way he was sizing them up – deciding whether or not to play along?  How had they missed it?  Just because he was Peter Pettigrew: small, talentless and easily overlooked?  “Anything else you need while I’m here?”

            “No, just the Cloak delivered,” James replied.  “Take care of yourself,” he patted him on the back as he opened the door for him, “and my Cloak too when it comes to that.”

            When James closed the door, Lily’s smile faded completely.  “Do you think he’ll find it?”

            “Of course he will,” James replied.  “We can’t pretend that he’s new at this, but it will be obvious that he tampered with the message.  If nothing else, it will give Dumbledore a reason to suspect him,” he continued as he plopped down on the couch, holding his head in his hands.  “Are you sure about the slips of paper?  He could claim to have lost them…”

            “He could turn us over to Voldemort at any time,” Lily said, walking over to her husband and sitting down on the coffee table across from him.  “We bluffed on the purpose of papers as best we could, and were as misleading as we could be.  We needed to give Dumbledore some hope of saving us.  If nothing else, of being able to find us and Harry.  And I need to see Remus.”

            “Do you think we can fight him, Lils?” James asked, looking up at her with frightened eyes.  “If it comes to that, do we have it in us to escape a fourth time?  And with Harry?  We always knew he was safe somewhere no matter what happened to us.  I always fought better with you there, because I’ll be damned if I was going to let him touch you, but I don’t know if I’ll be able to fight him with Harry in danger.  And we’ve never dueled him directly, Lils, not for the win.  Just for the escape.  He had to protect something from us, not the other way around.”

            Lily replied evenly, “If he doesn’t know we’re waiting for him, we’ll be the ones with the upper hand.”

            “Lily, you have to promise me that you’ll get Harry out of here,” James said earnestly, leaning forward and grabbing her hands so she couldn’t escape.

            “James,” she started, in her mollifying voice.

            “You have to promise me,” James repeated urgently.  “I can’t fight him knowing that Harry is up there unprotected, and you know that you can’t either.”

            “You said it before, we’re stronger together,” Lily reasoned, fear in her voice.

            “Lily, I’m not asking you to run from a fight,” he said, moving one hand to her cheek, holding it lightly in place so she had to face him.  “I know better than that.  I like my head just where it is, thank you very much.”  She laughed slightly.  “You need to take Harry because only you could get him to safety.  You’re the only one strong enough and smart enough to fool Voldemort long enough to get somewhere safe.  We can’t outrun him and, even together, you know we can’t overpower him, but I can keep him back long enough for you to get at least a little ahead of him.  And you, my brilliant, dizzy redhead, can stay one step ahead of any man in a chase.  I know that better than anyone.”

            “The only thing wrong with your plan,” she whispered, feeling and detesting the tears in her eyes, “is what happens when we’re safe?  Harry and I have to go on without you?  How’s that supposed to work, James?”

            “You have each other at least,” he replied seriously, “which is better than if Voldemort takes out all the Potters because we couldn’t bear to be parted.”

            “And we can’t reverse roles because?”

            “I’m not as smart as you,” James smirked.  “And although nothing short of this would get me to admit it, you’re trickier than I am.”

            Lily laughed bitterly, “Trickier than a Marauder?”

            “It takes me, comparatively, a long time to plan my pranks and tricks,” James said, “you can do it instinctively.”

            “As far as your plans go,” Lily said, “I still say this one sucks the most.”

            “I know,” James said, drawing her to him and holding her tighter than usual.  “Believe me, I know.”

            “What if you’re wrong about me?” Lily asked.  “What if I can’t save Harry?”

            “You’ll find a way,” James whispered to her.  “You’re Lily Potter.”

            “I love you, James,” she told him.

            “I know, doll.”

            There was a very brief tranquil moment.  Then Lily sat up slightly and said in a very different voice, “Did you just call me ‘doll’?”

            “Are you seriously ruining this ridiculously sentimental moment we have going here by questioning my pet names?”

            “Where did you get that one?  Your mistress?”

            “How long have you known?”

            “James Potter!”

            “Lily Potter!”

            “Seriously, where?”

            “One of those movies Marissa gave me when we went into hiding.  I put them in your potion, but then, I guess I didn’t really need to now.”

            “And which one had that lovely pet name?  I mean, seriously, what every adult, mature woman wants to hear is her husband calling her a toy.”

            “A musical called _Guys and Dolls_.  But if it helps, you’re my favorite toy.”

            “You’re so immature.”

            “Which is why I need toys.  Want to come play?”

            “And leave who on guard?  Or did this little interlude of flirting make you forget that there’s a war on?”

            “We’ve got awhile.  That riddle will take Peter an hour at least, and Harry’s out like a light.”

            “James!  Put me down!  I did not consent to this!”

            “You’re trying to teach Harry to put his toys away.  I’ve got to set a good example, Lils.”

            “That boy’s going to have even more trouble with women that you did with you as a mentor.”

            “Hey, I got my toy in the end, didn’t I?”

            “Oh, shut up, Potter.”

            “You first, Potter.”

 

30 Minutes Earlier

 

            “Lils,” James said quietly, knowing that he was treading on dangerous water, “why don’t you take a break?  Look, he’s sleeping…”

            “He sleeps a lot for a little boy,” Lily said, her voice betraying her highly emotional state.  The rest of her was perfectly still, standing ramrod straight over Harry’s cradle.  “Do you think he sleeps too much for a little boy?”

            “Well, he’s an extremely active one, it’s not really surprising,” James said, coming to within two feet of his wife but stopping just beyond easy reach.  “He does take after both of his parents, after all.”

            “Do you think he’ll ever do something like this?  Make a mistake about the people he should trust the most and destroy all of them in the process?  What a terrible fate for someone so wonderful,” Lily said, her voice dead and deceptively calm.

            “Lily, we didn’t know,” James said quietly.

            “We should have, James,” Lily replied.  “We should have.”

            “Lily, come downstairs.  Peter will be here soon,” James said softly, tentatively putting his arms around her from behind.

            “I can’t James,” she cried, leaning back against him but still staring at the sleeping baby.  “I can’t leave him up here alone when there’s going to be a traitor in our house.  I can’t!”

            “Hey,” he whispered soothingly, turning her around and taking her face in his hands.  “Sh, sh,” he said, as his strong wife finally burst into tears.  “It’ll be okay.”

            “How will it be okay?” Lily demanded.  “I failed him.  Peter bloody Pettigrew outsmarted us.  Politics.  Not even a battle, not even a straight fucking fight!  I could bear losing a straight fight!  While I was fighting and dueling and battling, my friend and partner was tricking me.  He was outmaneuvering me and I failed my baby.  I failed my baby.”

            “We haven’t failed him yet, Lily,” James said more than believed, pulling her closer and stroking her hair.  “We’re still here.  We can still set it right.”

            “Can we ever set it right without Marissa?” she demanded.  “Would we have ever even seen our danger without her?”  Lily let out a sob then practically yelled into her husband’s chest, “Merlin, why can’t it just be a straight fight?  Why does it have to be find the spy – spot the traitor – lose those you love even if you find the right one?  Why can’t we just fight?  I know how to fight.  I don’t know how to – I don’t know how to wait.  I don’t know how to flatter the man who’s going to kill me so he doesn’t look in that package and find the freaking _book_ that’s out only hope.  I only know how to fight.”

            “You also know how to live,” James told her firmly.  “And that’s what we’re going to do, Lily.  We haven’t failed Harry yet.”

            “I lost my best friend to this war three times,” Lily said quietly.  “When cancer would have done the job soon anyway.  In a world where that can happen, what can’t?”

            They both heard the door open.  “That would be Peter,” James said quietly.

            “Do you have the Cloak wrapped up?” Lily asked, pulling away and wiping her eyes.  “The book hidden inside it?”

            James pulled the package out of his pocket.  “Are you ready?”

            Lily smiled wryly. “Are you?” she countered, reaching up to wipe the stray tear from his right eye.  “Ready to smile in the face of the man who betrayed me and probably killed the woman who he once referred to as the angel of Hogwarts?  Of course.  I told you the day our son was born, I can do anything for Harry.”

            “I love you, Lily Evans.”

            “Lily Potter, you numskull.  I’m not your bloody mistress.”

            “I know.  She doesn’t hit.”

 

One Day Earlier

 

            “So how does this one work?” James asked, handling the package that Remus had dropped in their mailbox like it was a bomb that might go off – or start sprouting Dark Wizards – at any moment.

            “You say that like you think it’s not going to work the way it’s supposed to,” Lily all but snapped at her husband, adding the final ingredient as if for an extra burst of flavor.

            “I wouldn’t dare suppose such a thing, darling,” her husband replied, flashing his trademark smile at her.  “Even though you have considerably more reason than before to leave off of my more sensitive organs, at this point my reflex is still to shield them from your wily wand.”

            “If I’d known you were going to blame my wand waving any time that the sex isn’t as mind-blowing as on our honeymoon, I would have just given you an aneurism and been done with it,” Lily said in a ferocious tone that didn’t fool her husband for a second.

            “So how’s it work, love?” James tried again, walking forward with the package extended far out in front of him.

            “Drop the package into the cauldron,” Lily instructed him, “but make sure that you don’t stick your hand in.  Don’t worry, it won’t splash and burn holes in the floor.”

            “Again,” James reminded her.  “What did you open that time, a portal to another dimension?  It took three members of the Accidental Magic Reversal Squad a week to repair the damage.  They even brought in an Unspeakable.”

            “I’ve been careful since then.  Just drop it in, James,” Lily said, smiling and waving it off despite the deep blush that had risen to her cheeks.

            “I’m just saying, Lils,” James said, grinning impishly at his wife.  He dropped the package into the cauldron.

            Lily had not been mistaken about the splash this time.  The moment that the package hit the liquid, it formed a clear, solid rim at the top, like a pane of glass between the contents of the cauldron and the rest of the world.  The package settled delicately to the bottom of the cauldron.  Lighting their wands as one, the couple shined the combined light down onto the mysterious package, watching as the outer wrapping of plain brown paper undid itself as if an invisible hand were unwrapping it.

            “She must have tied the packaging with magic,” Lily murmured, “or Remus did.  Clever, if they thought we’d use this potion.  Then again, if they thought we’d use this potion or a similar spell…then it’s probably benign…or very, very subtle…”

            “What is this potion?” James prompted his wife to explain.

            “It traps and undoes any magical tampering that was done to the object,” Lily explained.  “When it detects a significant spell, it will tell us what it is.  Then we can figure out what we’re dealing with.  The really good news is that if it is a Portkey, Voldemort and his Death Eaters will be stripped of their powers if they use it and end up inside the cauldron.”

            “Who would have thought we’d have a reason to wish that two of our greatest friends were trying to give Voldemort a chance to attack us?” James tried to joke.  They both moved instinctively a little closer at the spike of pain in their chests.

            “Is that a book?” Lily asked, peering a little closer.  “It’s some solid blue block at any rate.”

            No sooner had she finished speaking than the entire cauldron’s contents turned blue for an instant, then gradually faded to clear again.  When the block was once again visible, it was clear that it was a book.  “So…what was that spell?” James asked, raising an eyebrow at his wife.

            Lily didn’t answer for a moment, her brow wrinkled.  “The spell that you boys cast on those books you gave Marissa,” she said in a quiet voice a moment later.  “Years ago in that ridiculous display…I guess she did know we’d use this potion.  It’s strange to think that she still knows us so well, but then I guess there’s no real reason that she shouldn’t…”

            They waited a few more minutes without any other bursts within the cauldron.  Then the book suddenly seemed to grow lighter.  It floated to the top of the cauldron and burst through the solid top of the potion, resting atop it.  Lily reached down and removed it carefully.

            “Is it safe, then?” James asked.

            “There’s no more magic in it,” Lily said, covering the top of the cauldron with a special black cloth.  “But why would she give us this?  One of the books you gave her?  And of all the books, _The Inferno_?”

            Lily examined the cover warily.  “Such a horrid picture, people burning in flames…”  She opened the book curiously but warily, and saw the writing in pencil scribbled hastily on the inside cover.  It was unmistakably Marissa’s handwriting, to a friend who had seen her through countless troublesome potions essays and tried to discern her notes for seven years.  “It looks like she wanted to say goodbye,” Lily murmured thoughtfully.  “She wanted to get a message to us, at any rate.”

            “Careful,” James warned.  “It could be a spell.”

            “I won’t say it aloud,” Lily said, “but it doesn’t look like anything like that.”

            James and Lily bent over the book that she had placed on her desk.  “What are these numbers?” James asked a moment later.  “And what does she mean by any of it?”

            It read:

 

            **‘Because it is a love story.**

**409.3.5.4**

**181.1**

**Many tell all to those beneath them, thinking blindly that it is as safe as houses on their breasts.**

**261.2.2.3**

**87.1.9.9**

**Seven years have I loved you, but those seven years must crack before peace can come.  My suffering is what it took for the truth to be known, do not grieve it.  Carry with you only the memories that sustain you.**

**39.1.4.2**

***B4’**

 

            Lily and James, at first, could not make heads or tales of this surprising message.  “The ‘B4’ suggests that it’s some numerical/alphabetical code, but what code would she be using?” Lily asked aloud.  “You and she didn’t have anything like that in school did you?  Or the Marauders more generally?”

            “We were more the ‘hiding in plain sight’ type,” James replied, “like our fairly obvious pseudonyms.  You and Marissa were the more cloak and daggers type.  No secret codes?”

            Lily shook her head.  “What about the Potter family?  Anything coding system that B4 might indicate?” she inquired.

            “No,” James replied.  “Besides, the message is written in mixed format.  What message could she have to deliver with that many numbers in a row?”  He peered at it for a moment before adding in an incredulous voice, “Why go through all this trouble to give us a code we don’t know how to solve?  It obviously took a lot of specialized magic to read the message at all…and she might even have thought that only I could remove that blue spell…why put it in a code we can’t read after that?”

            “What if it’s not in code?” Lily asked.  James could hear in her voice how quickly the wheels were turning in her head.  “The ‘B4’ comes after the message.  We might have erased a magically inscribed message to someone else – someone who would know what code to use – in that potion.  Or it could be hidden somewhere else where he will know to look.  The part before that is for us.”

            “And what does it say?” James asked.  “Even the parts that use words don’t make sense.  ‘Because it is a love story’? ‘houses on their breasts’?”

            “Think, James, we need to think,” Lily admonished unnecessarily.  Her husband let it go because he knew it was her way when she was struggling with a difficult problem.  “What if ‘Because it is a love story’ is Marissa’s answer to my question earlier?  About why she was always so attached to the _Divine Comedy_ , and _The Inferno_ in particular?  I certainly asked her enough times over the years; I never received a real answer…”  That resonated with Lily Potter, but in a way that she couldn’t quite name.  The idea of an answer to an old, oft-evaded question stirred in her mind and upset much of her equilibrium.

            “Could the numbers be from the book?” James asked, seizing on the idea.  “Say, page 409?  But what are the 3, 5, and 4?”

            “Paragraph, line…and word?” Lily finished his thought, already flipping to the appropriate page in the book.  After a few seconds, Lily found the passage that it would refer to and read aloud, “‘What.’”  Do you think this could be a message?

            They went through all of the message in this manner.  “What since beware Cerberus I,” James read when Lily had completed the list of words on a spare sheet of parchment.  “Sirius?”

            “It doesn’t make sense,” Lily said in slight frustration.  “Could it be ‘what sense is it to be wary of Cerberus’ – as in why would we doubt Sirius?  And then ‘I’ as her signature?”

            “It could be…” James said hesitatingly, “but what if it’s more than just one word?”

            “Huh?” Lily asked, glancing up at her husband.

            “What if that’s only the beginning word?  Do each of those words start a sentence?” James suggested.

            It came about that they did.  Taking the whole sentence that began with the selected word, they came up with the full message:

 

            **‘Because it is a love story.**

**What if Count Ugolino had the name of betraying thy strongholds, thou shouldst not have put his children to such torment.**

**Since love of my native place constrained me, I gathered up the scattered leaves and restored them to him, who was already hoarse.**

**Many tell all to those beneath them, thinking blindly that it is as safe as houses on their breasts.**

**“Beware, beware!” drew me to him from where I stood, then I turned like one that is eager to see what he must escape and is unmanned with sudden fear.**

**Cerberus, a beast fierce and hideous, with three throats barks like a dog over the people that are immersed there.**

**Seven years have I loved you, but those seven years must crack before peace can come.  My suffering is what it took for the truth to be known, do not grieve it.  Carry with you only the memories that sustain you.**

**I am Beatrice that do bid thee go.’**

 

            “Not too much more sense,” James murmured thoughtfully.

            “Is this a sort of code?” Lily asked, peering at the difficult riddle.  “She sets each part separately, she probably didn’t mean it to be one coherent sentence like I originally thought.  Good spot there, James.”

            “What else would you expect, my darling?” James replied haughtily.

            “Not now, help me think this out,” Lily said, waving her hand as if it would quiet him.  She bent far over the book, as if proximity would make the message more intelligible.  “What if Count Ugolino had the name of betraying thy strongholds, thou shouldst not have put his children to such torment,” she read aloud, as if murmuring to herself.  “Is she making a veiled reference to the Fidelius Charm?  Of what significance?”

            “Well,” James said uncomfortably, “Count Ugolino, if I remember correctly, was in the Ninth Circle of Hell – the last one – where treachery is punished.”

            “Treachery?” Lily echoed, looking up at her husband with concerned eyes.  “…had the name of betraying thy strongholds,” Lily said again.  “That must mean our Secret Keeper.  What this about our treating Peter’s children badly? Or I guess she would think it’s Sirius.”

            “That might mean Harry,” James replied.  “Perhaps it’s a reprimand for our Secret Keeper, whom she seems to think has betrayed us.”

            “Or is trying to make us think has betrayed us,” Lily countered.  “Although this is a rather elaborate trick.”

            “Which makes it all the more convincing,” James pointed out, like a true Marauder.

            Lily nodded.  “I can’t make out the next bit at all.  ‘Since love of my native place constrained me, I gathered up the scattered leaves and restored them to him, who was already hoarse.’”

            “Skip it for now,” James suggested.  “The next part she wrote in English, ‘Many tell all to those beneath them, thinking blindly that it is as safe as houses on their breasts.’  That seems to be another Secret Keeper warning, but is it there in case we didn’t figure out the numbers?  And why ‘on their breasts’?  Shouldn’t it be ‘in’?  And why ‘breasts’ at all?  And – oh, Merlin, Lily…she must know it’s Peter!  ‘beneath them’!  She couldn’t think that Sirius-“

            “It’s unkind to even think it of Peter,” Lily pointed out, snapping her head briefly around to face her husband with a miniature glare.  But a minute later she had to admit, “It would certainly make more sense…but how could she?  And she thinks that Peter will betray us?”

            “We’d better warn him,” James said.  “Sirius can help him go deeper into hiding…”

            Lily was already engrossed in the next part of the cryptic message, “‘Beware, beware!’ – well, I guess she would want us to beware if she thought Peter had betrayed us, again unless it’s a trap, but why tell us that they know it’s Peter if it’s an elaborate trap? – ‘drew me to him from where I stood; then I turned like one that is eager to see what he must escape and is unmanned’ – again, sensible if she believes that…but why tell us?  A warning not to be hasty?  And go rushing off after Sirius and Peter!  She knows us too well.”

            “Then the part about Cerberus must mean Sirius,” Lily continued muttering under her breath.  “Don’t yet!” she cried out to detain her husband as he started to mount the stairs.  “If they know it’s Peter, and are telling us, it could be a trap sprung for us.  And if they already knew before she died, there’s probably precious little that we could do to hide him now.  Pretending we don’t know might be best…and this seems to indicate that she’s talking about Sirius after all…if we overreact it might tell them more than…just wait until we’ve solved the puzzle.  What could she mean by this?  Why would Voldemort send us this through her?”

            James came back and bent over it with his wife.  “The next part seems straightforward, a fairly sentimental goodbye,” he mused.  “Then the bit about Beatrice – that could be her signature, using the pseudonym she took up at Hogwarts from this book.”

            “That was Francesca,” Lily corrected him.

            “Which I always thought was odd,” James added, “I always thought that Snape, in her presence, was much more like Dante with Beatrice than the dashingly handsome Paolo seducing his brother’s wife.”

            “What’s the story of Dante and Beatrice?” Lily asked her husband abruptly, and, from the sound of her voice, she was very close to something.

            “It’s ‘Bee-ah-tree-chay,’ love.  Italian, not ‘Bee-uh-tris.’  Anyway, Dante was in love with this woman Beatrice, from about ten years old, I think,” James said.  “My mother drilled all the classic works into me from an early age, but I’ve forgotten a lot of it.  She died, I think, and the _Divine Comedy_ is about how she sent Virgil to guide him through hell then led him through heaven…show him the error of his ways, bring him out of darkness.  That was her mission or something like that.”

            Lily froze, and all of the color drained out of her face.  “Mission,” she repeated, very hoarse indeed.  Then she turned wild and frightened eyes on her husband, “James,” she cried breathlessly, “She’s Beatris.”

            “Bee-ah-tree-chay, Lils,” he corrected, smirking.  “I told you it’s Ital-“

            “No,” she interrupted him, deathly serious, “She’s _Beatris_.  Marissa is Beatris.”  The light of recognition – and accompanying horror – came into James’s eyes even before Lily concluded, “The Order’s Beatris.  It’s her codename.”

            “Sweet Morgana,” James practically whispered.  “Of _course_ she is.  Beatris, the spy and recruiter…it explains her attachment to the Malfoys, the absences, the blunt refusal to declare for one side or the other…and I suppose that would make Remus Twinbuilder.  We thought that once and Beatris for Riss, but the codenames were just so obvious for operatives doing such sensitive work…”

            “Why is Twinbuilder obvious for Remus?” Lily demanded, nervousness rising to a feverish pitch in her voice.

            “Romulus and Remus, twin brothers raised by wolves who founded Rome,” James answered distractedly.  Then he turned to his wife in dismay, “They’re on our side.  Oh, Lily, what have we done?”

            For an unbearable second, their eyes met in a paralyzing mixture of horror, guilt and terror.  Then Lily bolted up the stairs with a cry of, “Harry!”  She sprinted through the house as if the revelation would cause Voldemort to strike instantly, imagining for those horrified few seconds as she ran through the house that she was too late, that they had stayed in the basement, far from him, too long.

            James was scarcely two seconds behind her and skidded into the nursery just as she practically collapsed with relief over Harry’s cradle.  Lily could have cried to see her child at that moment.  James did not look much more composed, clutching the book in his hands as he came to stand over his wife and child.

            Never one to miss his cue to sit up and be cute for hugs, Harry sat up and glanced expectantly at his parents.  Lily obligingly folded him in her arms, having to remind herself for the first time since the Christmas Attack not to squeeze him as hard as her arms ached to hold him.  James put his arm around her and pulled her close with an unusually tight grip, placing a hand with exaggerated softness on Harry’s back.  As one, they sighed in relief.

            Then Lily’s eyes snapped open.  Harry started to squirm as she turned to James.  “What do we do now?”  She refused to put her baby down, however, even as he tried to reach for the ground.  “What _can_ we do now?”

            “I think that’s what the part we couldn’t decipher means,” James said, opening the book with elaborate care not to let Harry see the cover.  “ ‘Since love of my native place constrained me, I gathered up the scattered leaves and restored them to him, who was already hoarse.’ ”

            “Hogwarts?” Lily caught her husband’s meaning.

            “Especially with the repetition of ‘seven years.’  She’s certainly loved us much longer than that.  We’ve got to get the message to Dumbledore,” James told her.  “He’s the one the code is meant for.  Perhaps she’s found a way to warn him if we can just get this to him.”

            “How can we do that?  How can we possibly get it to him?”

            “We’ll find a way,” James said grimly but with determination, tightening his grip on her even more.  “Who better than us to think up a sneaky plan?”

 

Three Hours Earlier

 

            James ventured down to the basement to find Lily trying not to cry as she added (threw almost violent so that each handful landed with a plop) some minced white ingredient.  “’Lo, Lils,” he said, affecting the carefree tone he had used at school, before ten thousand cares and worries crept their way into his life.  “Can you see the book like that?  Why don’t you stop if you feel like crying?”

            “I’m chopping onions,” she said, wiping her eyes brusquely, “I can’t help it.  And the potion is a carefully timed one, so I need to stay busy.”

            “All right, I can see where I’m not wanted,” he said, turning to go back up the stairs.

            “Hmph,” Lily grunted.  “I don’t think I’ll ever see _that_ day.”

            “Now, Lily, bringing up our courtship is just not fair!” James protested, turning on his heel to face her again, delighted that she wanted him to stay.  Harry was down for his nap, and he had absolutely nothing to do these days while his wife was busy and his son was sleeping.

            His wife eyed him archly, “These days you’re in little danger.  I’m disposed to think your perseverance charming rather than annoying.”

            “Really?” he said, swaggering over and folding her into his arms.

            “James!” she cried in protest, as he started kissing her neck.  “How am I supposed to concentrate?  This is important!”

            “Well, you managed to work with me sitting next to you for three years in potions, I don’t see why this should be any different,” he said pointedly, moving to her shoulders and not loosening his grip on her waist at all.

            “James, please,” she said, squirming but not making a serious effort to escape his grip on her.  She laughed as his lips starting tickling her.  “I can’t play with you until I deal with this.  We can’t just leave that parcel out there, especially if you believe what you believe about it.”

            “What I believe?” James repeated, pulling away to look at her.  “Lily. have you changed your mind because of a few impassioned speeches at the funeral?”

            “You didn’t hear them, James, you didn’t see that fight,” Lily said.  “Why would they have staged something so elaborate because I _might_ be watching?  It was too…real…and whatever we think of them, Remus loved her beyond reason.  We can’t doubt that.  Haven’t we always justified it that she was misguided or under Imperius and he followed her into hell blindly?  How could he have the strength for such a charade at her funeral?  One that was probably to an absent audience?”

            “Even if he didn’t know you were there, Gus was,” James replied.  Lily fell silent to consider this.  “Gus would have followed her anywhere, but that doesn’t mean that she would have told him.  Especially when he was under Dumbledore’s care.  Remus could have exerted the strength to fool Mundungus for her memory, to preserve her character with her brother.”

            Lily practically fell back onto the stool.  The logic, the reason of this struck down her wild hope.  Of course, that was what it must be.  That was what it had to be.  The alternative was Peter or Sirius.  James quickly enfolded her in his arms.  “This hurts worse than letting go of them the first time,” she said quietly.

            “I know,” James replied.  “I think every time will hurt more.”

            They stayed there only a moment before Lily straightened.  “I still need to finish the potion.  We can’t leave that package sitting out there.”

            “Call me when you’re done,” James said, releasing her and heading up the stairs again after a quick kiss.

 

One Hour Earlier

 

            “James,” Lily called, trying to keep her instincts from stoking her panic, “Did you give Peter leave to tell Remus where we live?”

            “No,” James called back from the other room.  He sounded casual, but she could tell by his footsteps that he was coming down the hall at no leisurely pace.

            “Would Peter have told him on his own?” Lily asked nervously.  “I mean, didn’t he say that he was going by after the funeral?”

            “What’s going on, Lily?  Facts, then conjectures,” James said as he swept into the room and walked directly to the window through which Lily was peering.

            They stood and watched as Remus Lupin, who had been making his way slowly up the street throughout their conversation, stopped at the gate to their house.  He stood in front of it, peering at it for a very long time, as if unable to make out the details of it.  Then his whole body seemed to sag.  Both Lily and James, hating themselves for it, flinched and drew their wands when he reached into the pocket of his overcoat.  He pulled out a relatively small package and placed it in their mailbox.  Then he turned and, with one last look at the house, walked down the other side of the street.

            Lily immediately slid out from her husband’s semi-protective embrace, which he had instinctively formed around her.  “I have the books on Fidelius.  I think that the curse doesn’t stop him from knowing or guessing where we are, he just can’t find _us_ or deliberately harm us here.  I can’t think immediately of any object that would counteract that.  I mean, if it were a bomb or something he couldn’t have planted it so near us and if it were a Portkey…even if it took us somewhere it wouldn’t change that they can’t find us… And he probably thinks we’d be monitoring this place closely wherever we are…  ”

            “Charm,” James said quietly, interrupting his wife’s rapid monologue.  She turned to look at him.  “You said ‘curse.’  It’s the Fidelius Charm.”

            “No,” she said seriously, “it’s a curse, James.”  Then she hurried up the stairs to her library (and to check on Harry along the way).

            “Lily,” James said as he entered the room where Lily was already skimming through a large, moldy book, “are you all right?”

            “No,” she said simply.

            He came up behind her and put his arms around her.  “Fidelius allows us to protect Harry,” he whispered to her.  “It’s probably the only way that we could know that he’s safe, the only way that we could protect him now.  It’s not a curse.”

            “Anything that forces me to witness that horrible fight between Remus and Mundungus without being able to do anything is a curse,” she told him.  “Anything that makes them think that we really don’t care even enough to go to the funeral is a curse.”

            “Lily, you know it was dangerous to go at all,” he tried to soothe her.

            “No,” she interrupted.  “You weren’t there.  You didn’t hear them.  You didn’t see that empty church.  Her husband, her brother and Severus Snape.  That’s all.”

            “You went,” he reminded her.

            “No, I didn’t,” she said softly.  “My best friend died, and I most certainly did _not_ go to her funeral.”  James tightened his hold as she let out a sob.  “What happened to us, James?”

            “Lily, don’t waver,” he told her.  “Nothing’s changed.  That fight could easily have been staged.  They could have guessed that we would be hiding in the church –“

            “You didn’t see it,” Lily insisted, turning around and burying herself in James’s chest, where she had always felt safe and comforted before.  She was beginning to think that there was no comfort sufficient for this.

            “I need my cauldron,” Lily said.

            “Good, good, do some potion work and clear your head,” her husband said, nodding his approval.

            “No,” she told him, “I’m going to design something so that we can look at that package safely.  Screw the Fidelius curse.”

 

Two Hours Earlier

 

            What Lily Potter felt on entering St. Martha’s Cathedral cannot be described in a few words, even such loaded ones as grief, loss, anguish and mourning.  The emptiness of the church was the first thing that assailed her, before even the coffin that loomed at the front of the altar.  She had thought to settle in the back and ignore the fact that she was invisible – or rather, even more profoundly unnoticeable than that.  She was distinctly aware that she would, except for the Fidelius charm, have stood out like a sore thumb at this service.  So she dared to walk to the front row; dared to approach the coffin that held the empty body of her old best friend; dared to listen to the conversation of the three men who had loved Marissa Lupin so much that her death shattered them – left them without a sense of who they were or what to do without her that went beyond all but the most exceptional mourners.

            Lily found herself transfixed there, even after the conversations of the men around her had faded away.  She stood staring at the girl who had once seemed to her like an angel come down from heaven, but human angels never bear up to the scrutiny that some give them.  Lily looked at the familiar face that she knew as well as James’s or even her own.  A face she knew better than Harry’s.  She tried to see in the cold, no longer lively face, what behind the mask had turned her into a traitor.  She reached out and touched her hand, timidly, then shied away as if it had shocked her.

            “Who are you?” she whispered, staring and trying to find where the friend that she had loved for so many years stopped and the betrayal underneath began.  Usually her thoughts were deeper than words, and, at times, devolved into mere staring.

            Shouts finally drew her from her reverie.  “You mean you _did?_ You shortened her life for _them?_   Where the hell are they, Remus?  Why didn’t they have the decency to come?  This empty church is what we gave up months of her life for?  _Months,_ Remus.  Bloody months we could have had with her.  For people who didn’t even come today.  Why?”  Lily turned to see Mundungus’s face, red in anger, glaring at Remus Lupin as a scandalized priest hurried forward to silence them.

            “I don’t know!” the tortured cry of Remus Lupin echoed through the cathedral.  It truly was a shockingly large place for this meager funeral.  Lily instinctively started forward to comfort or quiet them.  She stopped when she heard the pounding of her footsteps on the tile and knew than none of the others could hear it.

            “I don’t know anything anymore!  I don’t know how they could abandon us!  But then I don’t know how they could think we betrayed them, I don’t know how they could distrust us, I don’t know how they could cut us out of their lives!  I can’t conceive of how we got where we are today!”

            Lily was very glad that she had stopped.  She was very glad that she could not have been heard, because all of a sudden, she had no words.

            “Merlin, what the hell is wrong with you?  Both of you were always like this!” Mundungus screamed.  “What does it _really matter_ that your Hogwarts friendship dissolved in the real world?  I don’t expect Toby and Mary and Sean to be my best friends forever!  We’ll work different places, we’ll live different places and we won’t act like the world must be coming to an end if we grow apart!”

            “The Marauders weren’t like that!  We meant something to each other!  Something big, something that doesn’t come around for most people even once in a lifetime.”  At that, Mundungus Fletcher looked like he wanted to reach out and strangle Remus Lupin.  His hands actually reached out and clasped on empty air in front of him, as if they could not bear to stay still in the face of such a position.

            But the words had an even greater effect on Lily Potter.  They were talking about her, her and the other Marauders.  She had suspected it – known it – but for it to truly be brought home unsettled her.  Then there was the loyalty that Mundungus was saying that Remus and Marissa felt for them was insane, because _they_ had turned their backs on the Lupins!  Rage at such a ridiculous position filled her – could they have expected them to follow them to the ranks of Voldemort out of the obligation of a childhood friendship?  The Lupins were the ones who had betrayed them!

            “Something that was _over_ long before you stopped fighting for it!  They would not have done half of what you’ve done for them for you!  They won’t even _come to her funeral._   What is your insane loyalty to them?”

            “What loyalty?” Lily actually demanded aloud, unheard by the others.

            “We couldn’t give up on them!” Remus cried, sounding pained.

            “Well you bloody should have,” Lily said forcefully, striding forward to join them marching up and down the pews.  “We will never turn, you could have given up on us long ago!  And good riddance!”

            “No, _she_ couldn’t give up on them!” Mundungus corrected.  “She was insane and romantic and sentimental and unrealistic and that’s her fucking prerogative because that’s who she’s always been!  You’re the pessimist, realistic one who’s not supposed to let her get herself killed on some damned fool _hopeless_ crusade!  Why did you choose _now_ to let her control you when this was the moment to save her?”

            “You’re damned right it’s hopeless,” Lily returned, but this didn’t sit quite so easily.  Voldemort’s side looked far from hopeless at the moment.  Did Mundungus mean recruiting the rest of the Gryffindor Six?  It would make sense, but it didn’t seem truly reasonable…

            “We thought we were protected!  You know the precautions we were taking-“

            “Which brilliantly included telling two men, at least one of whom we know has betrayed all of us!  Yes, I can’t think of a safer situation!”

            There was a ringing silence, during which both Remus Lupin and Lily Potter could see a revelation coming over Mundungus Fletcher.  The latter observer had no idea what it was, but the former knew, and cringed.  “No,” Mundungus whispered.  “That’s what happened isn’t it?” he demanded.  “You had both of them come to see her.  So she could find out who had betrayed them; she deliberately put herself in danger when you wouldn’t be able to help her.”

            Lily actually had to sit down on the pew nearest her.  Her world had just turned upside down.  She needed a second to right it.  Did he mean – did Mundungus think that – no…he couldn’t…

            Remus had said nothing.  Now Mundungus continued, “So, either Peter Pettigrew tripped the latch and barricaded himself in your house or Sirius Black sent Death Eaters to finish the job without him,” Mundungus said quietly.  “You think they sent Malfoy?  He would certainly have loved the twist of making you her killer.  And thus ended Marissa Fletcher.”

            “Dung-“

            “You know,” Mundungus said over him, his mouth twisting into a wry smile that made him look shockingly like his sister, “I really had you guys figured wrong.  I thought when I met Lily and James and Sirius that they were the most arrogant, conceited, big-headed people in the world.  But no, it’s the two of you!”

            Lily did not even react to the insult.  Now she was only a pair of eyes watching their sincere faces and a pair of ears hearing their world-shattering words.

            “Mundungus, stop it.”

            “You thought that she could turn the man who betrayed _Lily and James Potter_ with – what?  A half hour’s chat by the deathbed?  I mean, she was amazing but what were you thinking?”

            _They betrayed me!_ Lily’s mind screamed.  Not Sirius!  Not Peter!  This is some elaborate trick!  No!

            “It’s what she’s been doing for years, she couldn’t turn away when it was our friends at stake-“  Lily snapped back to attention when she heard that, her eyes practically bugging out of her head.

            “Regulus Black is not the former best friend who betrayed Lily and James bloody Potter!  Merlin!  Are you the only two people in the wizarding world who don’t understand the massive tidal wave of darkness and death and despair that has engulfed our entire world?  And _you can’t fix it._   You can’t turn the tide.  The Gryffindor Six isn’t enough.  You are not enough.  You threw her life away for _nothing._ ”

            Shrugging off the priest, Mundungus turned and walked out of the doors with one last backward glance at his sister’s husband.  “And maybe the wizarding world’s not worth saving.  It can’t even come to her bloody funeral.”  Then he was gone, leaving the indignant priest to hurry her husband out of the church behind him.

            Lily stayed, unhurried and unable to move.  This couldn’t be true.  This couldn’t be what she thought it meant.  This could not be the truth.  This had to be a trick.  An elaborate trick.  She was misreading everything.

            Then why did it have such a ring of truth in her eager ears? 

 

Six Days Earlier

 

            Lily Potter did, actually, know that it would in all likelihood be the last time that she saw Marissa Lupin alive.  Pretending that she didn’t would be a superficial lie.  What was more, she knew that Marissa Lupin knew that it would probably be the last time they saw each other, judging from the look in her eyes.  It was mournful, but Lily Potter resolved herself not to be fooled.  She would not be duped into disbelieving what she knew, from evidence, because Marissa Lupin, as always, was a fabulous actress.

            “Goodbye, Lily,” she said softly, her voice and eyes heartbreakingly wistful.

            “Do give Mrs. Malfoy my regards,” Lily told her coldly as she opened the door for her former friend.

            “As you wish,” she nodded, sighing sadly as she allowed her husband to steer her out of the house, clucking worriedly over her health.  Lily stood at the door long enough to hear her murmuring reassurances that she was fine to her overprotective husband.  Lily stood at the door and watched the sweet scene that the couple would have made if it was not for the side that they had chosen.  Who would have thought, even just a short while ago, that Lily Evans would choose for her last words to Marissa Fletcher a dig about Narcissa Black?  It had been a source of contention for them for years, but it had not come between them until the past two.

            “Wotcher, Lils,” Sirius said as he came up behind her.  Lily turned with a warm smile to see him shrugging on his overcoat.  “You’re looking awfully sentimental just now.  Don’t want to spoil your image.”

            Sirius crushed her into a hug and whispered, “You both know you’ll have to move now, right?”

            “Harry’s already at Godric’s Hollow with our luggage,” Lily whispered back, giving Sirius, her best friend too these days, an extra squeeze to reassure him.

            “Black!” James trumpeted from the entrance of the foyer.  “How many times do we have to go through this?  Hands off the wife!  You had your chance, she’s mine now.”

            “Well, I was her first pick,” Sirius said, sounding very pleased with himself, even as he let James yank Lily out of his grasp.

            “I am not some ruddy football,” she complained as her husband tightened his grip around her to prevent her from escaping.  “And if you two don’t behave, I swear I’ll run off with my partner.”

            Peter, who had entered a little behind James, immediately dropped on one knee.  As James glared at him over Lily’s head – with his arms still around her, Peter declared, “Lily Potter, you are the most beautiful and most brilliant woman that I know.  Why don’t you leave this great dolt and come away with a man who appreciates your worth?”

            “Do you not like your balls in their current position, Wormtail?” James glowered down at him.

            “Way to make me want to stay with you,” Lily interjected cheekily, “regress into a caveman.”

            “Come along, Peter,” Sirius laughed, pulling Peter to his feet.  “I think all competing males had better leave before James pops a gasket.”

            “Good night!  Come back anytime!” Lily called after the boys as they left into the billowing wind of the late October night.

            “You see!  I have reason to be jealous!” James called, tightening his grip on her even more.

            “We’d better hurry, Padfoot,” was the last sound that they heard before the door closed.  

            The quaint scene, nostalgic of earlier and simpler times, dissolved in an instant.  Only stolen moments were real these days.  Most were acts put on, hollow reenactments of happier days before the War.  “Are you ready?” James asked his wife, not relaxing his grip in the slightest.  His voice had gone from playful to hard and serious.

            “Yes,” his wife said in a similar tone.

            “Let’s go together,” he said quietly.

            “Very well,” she replied, “ _Apparatus._ ”

            When they exploded with an nearly inaudible pop onto the desolate moor, James turned to his wife with a smirk, “I meant I’d take you along.”

            “Of course you did,” Lily shook her head at him.  “I know you that well by now, but how is it that you don’t know me well enough to know that I wouldn’t go along with that?”

            “ _Apparatus,_ ” James said by way of answer.  After a few more jumps to secluded spots, they arrived at the Portkey Dumbledore had set up for them.  Lily had previously warded the whole of Godric’s Hollow so that no one could Apparate within three miles of the town.  So they went up to see Harry sleeping soundly in his cradle, guarded by the young babysitter from the village who wouldn’t be able to find them for a reference in two days time.

 

One Year Earlier

            

            “Where is he?” Lily demanded, rushing into her house.  “James!” she called wildly.  “Harry!”

            “Lily?” Marissa called, bolting out of the living room at a speed probably not entirely wise in her deteriorating condition.  “What’s wrong?”

            “Where is he?” Lily demanded harshly, almost glaring at her best friend of nine years with something past fear and near anger.  “Is Harry all right?”

            “Why wouldn’t he be?” Marissa gasped, taking a step back at the look on Lily’s face.  “Did something happen?” she asked, hurrying back into the room from which she had come and leading the nearly distraught and injured Lily over to the bassinet that held her baby.  

            Lily simply scooped him almost desperately into her arms.  “Oh my baby, you’re okay,” she sighed, rocking him back and forth.  “It’s all right, Harry, you’re okay.”

            “Nothing happened, did it?” Marissa said quietly, “at least, nothing that you thought would harm Harry.”  Lily looked up at Marissa and almost couldn’t bear to meet her best friend’s gaze.  “You thought I would hurt him,” she whispered incredulously, backing slowly away.  “Lily, say that password so I can go.”

            “Riss, I didn’t mean…” Lily tried, not sure if she could say anything true to mend this breach.

            “Say the damn password or I’ll assume you’re a Death Eater in disguise!” Marissa shouted, the tears in her voice perfectly clear.  It nearly broke Lily’s heart despite her fears.  “What are the names of the Lost Boys?” __

            “I have no idea.  I haven’t read _Peter Pan_ since I was a kid,” Lily said quietly.

            “Goodbye, Lily,” Marissa said quietly, grabbing a bit of floo powder and throwing it into the fire.

            “Riss-“ she tried again.

            “Lupin Manor,” Riss said, giving one last fearful and hurt look in her direction before fleeing into fire.

            Lily hung her head and collapsed in exhaustion onto her chair, still holding Harry.  “You are all right, aren’t you, little man?” she whispered, wondering if she had been wrong and if it even mattered any more.  After all, it might be too late now whether or not she was right.

 

Twenty Minutes Earlier

 

            When she was making her report to the Order, Lily Potter would honestly be unable to tell them how the mission had gone so terribly wrong.  Her best guess was that the Death Eaters had been tipped off somehow.  They had certainly known precisely where Lily and Peter were hiding.  Not that she had any time to think about it during the battle that ensued.  Of course, she was lucky to get a shot off at all.

            While the lead Death Eater was distracted – why did they always attack in a triangle like that?  One of these days she was going to find a way to knock them over like bowling pins – she knocked Peter behind a fairly large bureau.  “Cover me!” she shouted, taking aim and firing off a series of curses at the other Death Eaters.  A light blue shield flared up at just the wrong moment, causing her to let her guard down despite the fact that the recovered lead Death Eater’s last curse had gotten through already.

            She was lucky it wasn’t worse, but it was pretty bad.  A moment later, a flash of light forced Peter, attempting to come to her aid, to throw himself to the side.  As the rest concentrated their firepower on the Order member still up and firing, the leader of the pack approached the disabled one, massaging his chest lightly and vindictively leering at her.  She still couldn’t rise, the pain in her chest nearly blinding and most of her strength zapped with it.  Lily Potter was prone and helpless, and it was a feeling she hated more than Voldemort himself.  It was even worse than it had been to leave her baby for a mission for the first time.  The only thing worse was the knowledge that she _had_ lost her edge during her maternity leave from both work and Order business, and the thought of what would happen to Harry if she were hurt.

            “The mighty Lily Potter,” the masked man said in amusement.  It was a voice that Lily would have recognized anywhere.  “Put in her place at last.”  Lucius Malfoy drew his wand and whispered, “ _Crucio!_ ”

            “No!” Peter shouted and dove as if out of nowhere in between the wand and Lily, taking the full brunt of the curse.  Roused by her partner’s screams, Lily managed to sit up and fire a curse at Lucius Malfoy who flew back against the wall and toppled to the ground.  Glaring through their masks, the other Death Eaters grabbed their fallen leader and Disapparated.  Even in her emotional state, Lily was surprised that they rescued even the lead Death Eater rather than staying to finish the attack, especially with both her and Peter so close to being out of commission.  Malfoy must have been much higher up on the hierarchy than they had believed.

            “Peter, are you all right?” she asked, with difficulty raising herself up and leaning over the small, mousy young man who had taken an Unforgivable for her.  “Peter, talk to me,” she said more urgently.

            “We’d better get out of here,” he said, sitting up slowly, appearing mostly recovered.

            “Apparate home?” Lily confirmed, struggling to her feet.

            “Not yet, you’re still too weak,” Peter said.  “Side-along apparition.  Hold on.”

            “Thank you, Peter,” Lily said, allowing herself to lean on his arm as the pain racked through her chest and her knees nearly buckled in the aftermath of the curse.

            “Hell, I got the hang of side-along apparition days ago,” Peter jested.  “It’s no problem at this point.”

            “I don’t mean for finally passing your stupid test,” Lily said, looking up at him with a warm smile.  “I mean for-“

            “Of course, Lils,” Peter interrupted her with a serious look.

            She shot him a quick smile before, in very James-like fashion, turning the conversation into a joke before things became too mushy, “So how many times was it before you passed your Apparition test?”

            Peter laughed, “Seven, but even so I think I’ll do a better job than you right now.”

            Lily was about to protest, then swerved slightly on her feet.  Laughing slightly, she nodded, “Home, James.”

            “You are out of it.”

 

One Hour Earlier

 

            “So, I just fed him so he should probably be all right until I get back, but if not there’s a bottle of breastmilk in the fridge.  You do know how to heat it up?” Lily fretted, bustling about her house on a thousand invented errands as Marissa Lupin sat calmly on the couch, rocking Harry’s cradle slightly as she watched his mother in amusement.  “And of course the numbers are still in the same place as always, and of course if he gets sick St. Mungo’s is very close.”

            “I’m a trained Healer, Lily,” Marissa reminded her.  At a look from the frenzied mother, she added, “All right, so I can’t use most of my training at the moment in my diminished state, but I can still recognize the problem and probably head it off with a few potions.”

            “Okay, you’re still the most qualified babysitter I can get who doesn’t ask awkward questions,” Lily conceded.  “Just…take care of him, okay?”

            “Like he’s my very own godson,” Marissa replied with that familiar twinkle in her eyes.  “And don’t you mean who knows where you’re going so you don’t have to lie to?”

            Lily actually stopped short in her maternal rant and said unconvincingly, “Yeah, of course, I’m glad I have you.”

            “Always,” Marissa said with a warm, genuine smile that made Lily feel cheap for her nagging doubts.

            “So, how about lunch tomorrow, do you have anything?” Lily asked, trying to sound as casual and collected as her best friend.

            The smile froze on Marissa’s face.  “You know what I have tomorrow, Lily.  I seem to remember thirty or so conversations about what I have every Sunday afternoon,” she said, a note of warning in her voice.  “Do you really want to go ten rounds right now?”

            “They’re dangerous, Riss, I know you think that the Malfoys like you, but they are not good people,” Lily said.  “But you’re right,” she added, shrugging on her cloak, “I don’t have time to fight again right now.  I’ve got to go.”

            “Be safe, Lils,” Marissa said.

            “I’m just going out,” Lily said, “you take care of that baby.”

 

Eight Months Earlier

 

            The moment Voldemort and his Death Eaters had left, Lily Potter nearly swooned backwards, Marissa Lupin catching her in her arms.  “Are you all right, Lils?” she asked, somewhat breathlessly herself.

            “Fine,” Lily replied.  “Where’d you go?  I thought they’d gotten you.”

            “I ducked out of sight,” Marissa explained, lowering Lily to the ground as her own strength seemed to give out.  Lily tried to process Marissa’s words.  _She_ ran from a fray?  Lily had learned to stop conflict – magically and diplomatically – from Marissa Lupin.  She was the one who had taught Lily Potter how to protect with body, spirit and soul.  “I’m just a liability,” Marissa reminded as if she had heard her friend’s unspoken criticism and surprise.  “I can’t fight anymore – I can’t even levitate a feather anymore.  I’m worse than a first year.  I thought if I could sneak up behind one of them…I didn’t know you had everything so excellently in hand.  When are you due, by the way?”

            “Speaking of which,” James said, sitting up in obvious pain, “why does the Lord of All Evil know that you’re pregnant before I do?”

            “I’d say it was more a concurrent phenomenon,” Lily replied, “I wasn’t even sure…but the way that spell worked…”

            “We have a baby, Lils?” James asked, a look of joy – only slightly overridden with the lingering pain from the curses – suffusing his face.

            “Lay down, you madman,” Marissa laughed while the husband and wife made eyes at each other, unable to contain their joy even in the face of severe injuries and a near escape from danger.  “Seriously, Potter,” Marissa laughed, pushing him down.  “I’ll examine you in a moment to make sure you don’t have any permanent injuries.”

            Lily knelt nervously over her husband to make sure he complied, only occasionally stealing a glance at Marissa, who had bent over Regulus Black’s body.  She saw the tear slide down Marissa’s cheek as she slowly closed the empty eyes, then crossed herself.  “Rest in peace,” she whispered very quietly.  Then, softer still, “I’m sorry.”

            When she looked up at Lily again, she seemed startled to see Lily’s eyes on her and hastily wiped the tear away.  For a moment Lily must have looked stern, based on Marissa’s reaction, but then she smiled slightly.  “You make me feel guilty that I can’t summon a tear for Sirius’s brother,” Lily said quietly.  “Death Eater or no.”

            Marissa laughed hollowly, “I suppose that’s how he’ll always be remembered, despite everything,” she said almost to herself.  “But I don’t think he’d be offended Lily.  You’ll never cry at a funeral.”

            “What?” Lily replied, completely taken aback.

            “In helplessness, perhaps, but never in grief,” Marissa said quietly, looking down at the hands of Regulus Black.  “You’ll never drop crocodile tears for those you cannot mourn, and the death of those you do love numbs you.  When you attend my funeral, you will not cry, and I will not be hurt by it.  You will go home and wish you had wailed and gnashed your teeth.  But it won’t help you the way it does me, Lily.”

            “Are you so sure you’re going to die, Riss?” Lily asked quietly.

            “The doctors are,” Marissa replied, “and as a Healer I’m obliged to agree – at least until I’m out of training.”  Silence descended on them for a very long moment.

            “Well,” Marissa said a moment later, visibly pulling herself together, “Let’s get him home and James to the hospital, before they decide to come back.  Then we can discuss happier matters, like how we’re going to corrupt this new baby Marauder and who’s going to be your godmother.”

            “You’re going to pretend to let us choose?” Lily almost laughed despite everything.

 

Two Years Earlier

 

            “Blimey.”

            “Merlin.”

            “Bloody hell!”

            “Lily!” James started, turning around to stare at his girlfriend.

            “What?” she asked, defensively, turning around to face her boyfriend.  She adjusted his new graduation hat and tried to tuck a few errant tufts of hair under it so they would be less visible.

            “I just can’t keep up, woman,” he replied, leaning his head back so that it was out of her reach.  “One minute you’re trying make me look respectable and the next you’re swearing like a sailor.”

            “Oh please, like you and Sirius were shocked by that!”

            “Sirius and I were toning down the language for your sake!” James protested.      

            “Well, don’t bother.  You really think I don’t know you yet?” Lily asked.  “Besides, I’ve been waiting seven years to see Remus and Snape in a fistfight.  Pity Riss looks like she’s a few seconds from managing to break it up.”

            Sure enough, an explosion of blue light erupted from the wand of Marissa Fletcher, parting the two assailants and causing Madam Rosemerta to shriek even more indignantly.  Once the trio had been tossed outside, it looked as if both Remus and Snape would have loved to resume their brawl, but they held back because of their mutual concern for Marissa’s strength, apparently expecting the spell to have drained it completely.  She was shrugging them off and laughing gaily, her hat tipped whimsically to one side, but Lily could see the lines of real strain on her best friend’s face.

            “Tell you what, Mr. Moneybags Potter, why don’t you buy us another round or so and meet us out back?  I’ve got to know what finally sent those two over the edge,” Lily stood on her toes to give James a peck on the cheek, downed the bit of rum left in her glass, and grabbed her purse from the stool beside her.

            “My moneybags are on the alcohol,” James laughed as she swept out of Three Broomsticks, managing to make it out the door before she swayed slightly on her feet.  “Sirius,” he began, his eyes still following her.

            “Right on it, Prongs,” Sirius said, immediately following in the direction of three of their friends.  Peter stayed behind to help James.

            “Hey there, let me help you,” Sirius said with exaggerated care and concern when he caught up to Lily.  “Steady?  Can you make it back?”

            “Oh stuff it, Sirius,” she said before – to her horror – giggling.

            “You girls,” he said, shaking his head.  “You don’t appreciate the time and practice that it takes to drink like we do.”

            “Oh we appreciate the practice all right,” Lily snorted.  “We just don’t practice in public.  You’re right in a way though, I haven’t had a drink since Riss got sick.  Supportive and all that.”

            “Don’t tell me you two had a stash before that!” Sirius cried severely.

            “No, Riss had a stash and I had carte blanche to partake when I could.  She’s the one with the inattentive father and status as an adult and legal guardian,” Lily replied.

            Sirius actually stopped walking.  “I think my mind’s just been blown.”  Lily giggled again, which only encouraged him to continue, “Yep, there it went.  Seven years of Hogwarts education all gone with the winds.”

            “Good timing,” Marissa chirped in greeting, catching the tail end of his comment as they reached the couple exiled from Three Broomsticks.

            “And it’s all your fault, you little lush,” Sirius told her severely.

            “It always is,” Marissa replied with a shrug.  “What’d I do this time?”

            “They really didn’t know we were drunk the night of the Sugar Plum Fairy Attack,” Lily replied.

            “Seriously?” Marissa asked, raising her eyebrows.  “I thought singing along with our little creations had given us away for sure!”

            “What has the world come to?” Sirius moaned, looking at the sky in bewilderment.

            “A bittersweet end, mate,” Remus said, “weren’t you at the graduation?”

            “It’s only an end of Snape,” Sirius insisted.  “We’ll always be friends.”

            “I’ll drink to that!” Marissa replied cheerfully, pulling a flask from her purse.  Sirius swooned and fainted – in slow motion.

 

Three Months Earlier

 

            It’s a funny thing, when you feel your loyalties shift.  Most people don’t notice it, because it usually happens in a very small moment.  For Lily Evans it was watching James Potter sit at Marissa Fletcher’s bedside, reading her Shel Silverstein’s book _The Missing Piece_ , which Mundungus had brought by earlier.

            It was strange because she had come there to see Marissa.  However, in the scene that met her eyes in the Hospital Wing, it was James that she watched, his smile that warmed her heart.  His laugh was the one that enchanted her.  That’s when she knew that for the rest of her life, it would always be James Potter to whom she turned, he who brought spark to her life, and him whom she wanted to comfort her.  It had been Marissa, but seeing them together now, Lily knew that from now on it would always be James Potter to whom she was most loyal, around whom she built her life.  Her heart belonged to him.

            A moment later he spotted her, his eyes still twinkling and shining with mirth, and waved excitedly at her to join them.  That’s when Lily knew that, whether or not he knew it, whether or not it had been there as long as he claimed, she was first in James’s heart too.  Sometimes even when it’s the smallest of events, the change doesn’t go unnoticed.

            That night she told him that she loved him.  He freaked and could barely look at her for a week.  Then they had a fight.  Two days later, Peter slipped her a love letter that James had written but been too afraid to give her, and they made up.

 

Four Months Earlier

 

            “So, were you in on it too then, Peter?” Lily asked, draping her long red hair across her back closer to the fire so it would dry faster.  James quickly moved a stray piece out of harm’s way, shaking his head at his new girlfriend.

            “Of course,” Peter replied, and it would have taken more attentive people than the new couple to realize that he looked hurt.  “I was the one in charge of keeping you two from colliding on your way to the Chocolate Room.  You don’t remember me delaying you and Riss for five minutes, clucking about her health and wandering around the corridors?”

            “I guess I’m just too used to everyone being overly protective of Riss for it to make a big impression, I’m afraid,” Lily replied.  Truthfully, nothing at this moment made as big of an impression on Lily as the way that James Potter’s hand was lying just beside hers.  She felt like she was fourteen again with her first boyfriend, but her feelings for James were in a different league than the ones she had had for Sirius years ago.  She had been just discovering her feelings for Sirius at the beginning of their relationship.  The start of this one was when she stopped fighting the ones that had been growing for a very long time.  Plus she knew James now much better than she had known Sirius then.  The boys were still the ‘others’ back in fourth year.  Now they were as much a part of her as Riss had always been – the meddling fool who probably _shouldn’t_ have been wandering about the halls and shoving her through walls but just couldn’t miss the fun and bragging rights of finally forcing her and James together.

            “Oh no!” Lily suddenly exclaimed.  “I just realized – Riss!  She’s going to be insufferable!”

            “Marissa?  Please, I’m more worried about Sirius.  He’s not going to shut up about this for years to come,” James replied, shaking his head in anticipation of the endless raillery in store for both of them at the hands of their best friends.  More pressing, however, was the fact that James’s pinky was, ever so slightly, touching her own, and he began to move it up and down.  It sent shivers through her.

            “Well, I suppose it’s worth it,” Lily shrugged, trying to sound off-handed and determinedly not looking at James.

            “Are you kidding?  Do you know how many years I’ve waited to hear you talk like that?” James returned.  Oh, now they were definitely in dangerous territory.  Truthfully, it terrified Lily how long James had waited for her, how long he had liked her, how long he had pursued her.  She wanted to enjoy this beginning of their relationship without worrying about the endless list of terrible consequences from its potential end.  Every couple should have a chance to at least start before they had to worry about splitting up.

            The most worrying part was that it would be her fault.

            Oh, fire and brimstone, here she went again, and with James’s pinky now grasping hers too.  She squeezed the strange but also oddly familiar finger for reassurance.  She could feel James smiling at her – probably smirking – but she still didn’t dare look over.

            “So where are Riss and Sirius?  Remus too for that matter?” Lily asked, trying to focus on Peter but barely able even to see him with James so close, just barely touching her.  She could still feel his kisses sweeping through her, the taste of chocolate matching the chocolate pudding he had dumped into her hair.

            “You didn’t see Sirius come in the Common Room and spot us sitting here, then wink tremendously and tip-toe out again?” James asked, sounding amused and composed in a way that really wasn’t fair when she knew that her voice must be shaking every time she opened her mouth because every time she spoke she could feel his tongue running along the edge of her lips.

            “Subtle, aren’t they, our friends?” Lily laughed, mostly to disguise her overwhelming nervousness.  This was ridiculous.  She was seventeen years old.  She had known James Potter since she was eleven.  He was still the same messy-haired, annoying, crazy boy she knew so well.

            Oh, if only _that_ were true…

            “About as subtle as you two lovebirds are,” Peter rolled his eyes.  “Well, I may take longer than the rest but I get the point.  I’ll leave you to yourselves.”

            Lily turned in panic to call back her last line of defense from being alone with James Potter again, but in doing so she met his eyes.  Merlin but that boy had some eyes in his head.  Perhaps it was just the proximity to the fire, but Lily would swear that they were smoldering.

            “So,” she said as brightly as she could manage, channeling Riss in her perky moods, she turned around and leaned back into James’s arms, “what shall we talk about?”  She dared to smile up at him as his arms came around her from behind, sending ten thousand pricks of fire along the points of contact with her body.  He grinned back at her, that old impish grin that she knew so well and had feared for so long.  Somehow it looked much more inviting than intimidating up close.

            “Well, my favorite topic is always Quidditch,” James replied, relaxing back slightly and taking her with him.

            “What’s your second favorite?” Lily asked, wrinkling her nose slightly.

            “How to seduce you,” James replied evenly.

            “James!” she laughed, despite the flash of anger and…something else…that shot through her at that “innocent” comment.  Seeing his smirk, Lily changed tactics, “Only the second?” she replied archly.

            “It’s all in the timing, love, I’ve got a match on Saturday.”

            “And there’s nothing special about today then?”

            “Not that I can remember…ow!  Easy on the goods, darling.”  Lily hated herself for blushing and pretended that James couldn’t see.

 

Two Years Earlier

 

            “’Lo, Lils,” James Potter said cockily, swinging his book bag down on the potions station next to her.

            “Go away, Potter,” she said, her anger immediately flaring up.  “I don’t want to talk to you.”

            “We’re not supposed to talk in class, Lils, you should know that, living with a prefect like you do,” James pointed out, throwing himself carelessly into his chair and cocking his head in a way he obviously thought was devastatingly handsome.

            “Do – not – call – me – ‘Lils’ – you – wanker,” Lily grunted from behind clenched teeth.  “You are not my friend anymore, Potter.”

            “You want me to call you ‘Evans’ then?  Like we’re back in first year during that prank war?  Target Evans and Potter?” James asked, bored and contemptuous.

            “Go away!” she hissed in frustration.  “Can’t you see that I don’t want to talk to you, be around you or basically deal with you ever again?”

            “Now, now, _Evans_ ,” James said calmly, “let’s be reasonable about this.  ‘Ever again’ is much too permanent.  Once you calm down and are rational you’ll realize that my offence isn’t the high crime you suppose it to be.”

            “You told Sirius to break up with me!” she accused furiously.

            “Untrue, I resent that, Evans,” he replied.  “If you would let any of us explain, you would no longer harbor these, frankly, ridiculous delusions –“

            “I don’t want to hear it, Potter. I was involved in case you don’t remember; I know what happened,” she said huffily.  There was an awkward silence for a few seconds before Lily burst out again, “And although I shouldn’t be surprised at your self-centeredness after that, are you really so far gone as to make Riss sit with Snape just so you can harass me during my favorite class?”

            “Hey, I didn’t do that,” James said throwing up his hands.

            “Sure, Potter,” she practically spit at him as Slughorn entered the room.  “You’re the picture of innocence with the bottle of firewhiskey protruding from your knapsack.”

 

Four Months Earlier

 

            “Oh no,” Marissa muttered softly, her head falling into her hands.  “Do you realize what this means, Sirius?”  Lily stopped on the edge of the final stair before the one that would have brought her into view from the Common Room.  She could not deal with Sirius right now.  She was just beginning to get used to the idea of sitting with him in class everyday.  Why did he have to be _everywhere_?  Couldn’t _he_ stay up in his dorm room and be miserable – even just long enough to let her sneak down to steal food from the kitchens?  Then again, what did he have to be miserable about?  He was the dumper, not the dumpee.

            “That I’m the best friend ever?” Sirius offered, only half his heart in the usual joking tone that made her stomach turn over, even now.  The rest of his tone was sad, resigned.  Good.  At least he felt something.

            “It means I have to tell her, Sirius,” Marissa said miserably.  “I have to tell her something like that.”

            “No!” Sirius cried, “Riss, you can’t!  You _can’t_!  I broke up with her, it’s done.  What good will telling her do?”

            Lily hated the way her pulse started racing at the thought, _Does he want me back?_   Was that the secret that he didn’t want revealed?  Did he still care about her?  Did he regret everything he’d said?  Was he sorry for breaking her heart?  Was his heart broken too?

            “I can’t keep something like this from her,” Marissa said, sounding utterly depressed by the thought.  “She’s my best friend.”

            “No, Riss, she’ll hate James,” Sirius insisted, sounding desperate.  “It’s not his fault, really it isn’t.  I know it sounds like it is, but he never would have actually _asked_ me to break up with her.  She’ll hate him.  She’ll hate me more than she does now.  She’ll get the wrong idea.”  Lily’s blood ran cold.  James – _James?_ – had something to do with Sirius breaking up with her?  James – who seemed to understand her better than she did herself – second only to Marissa in her friendship?  James who had appeared there to comfort her when it had happened?  Appeared very conveniently…  If Lily had ever had any qualms about listening in on the conversation, or any thoughts of announcing herself and getting everything out into the open immediately, they were arrested.  Sirius’s words froze her in place in horror and fascination.

            “You haven’t seen her up there, Sirius, she’s a wreck,” Marissa replied, her voice tortured.  “I can’t see her like that – she’s been this way for days now!  She keeps saying over and over again, ‘why wasn’t I good enough?’ ‘what did I do?’ ‘what could I have done?’ ‘why doesn’t he like me?’  I don’t care if it hurts more than helps in the end, I have to tell her that it wasn’t because you don’t like her.”

            “And you didn’t see him,” Sirius insisted.  “For the month and a half we were together, with his constant sad eyes and depressed air, withdrawing whenever she’s mentioned like a wounded dove.  I was losing him bit by bit, and I couldn’t find out why.  My best friend was suffering and slipping away from me.  I swore I’d do anything I could to fix it.  Finally, he lets slip enough for me to figure it out.  Then I keep my promise.”

            “What, did you two think I’d go flying into his arms like some bloody football?” Lily heard an angry voice that sounded vaguely like her own explode into the Common Room.  Suddenly, her best friend and her ex-boyfriend were in full view and staring at her in surprise and horror, respectively.

            “It wasn’t like that, Lily,” Sirius insisted awkwardly, standing and quickly trying to make his point.  “James didn’t tell me to – he didn’t know I was going to – he didn’t have anything to do with it!”

            “I cared about you, Sirius,” she said in a dumbfounded voice.  “How could you just toss me aside like this?  James’s feelings must supersede everyone else’s?”

            “It’s not like that, Lils, please just listen to me –“

            “My name is not Lils, and you’ve lost the right to speak to me like we’re friends.”

            With that, Lily whirled and marched back up the stairs.  She vaguely heard Marissa pattering quickly after her a moment later.  At the last moment, she glanced back and saw Sirius Black silhouetted against the fire, his head in his hands in the perfect picture of despair.  She wanted to spit, and she wanted to run into his arms and cry.  She hated both him and his precious best friend for both emotions, which nearly overpowered her.

 

Three Years Earlier

 

            “Are there any questions?” Professor Flitwick made the mistake of asking his class of first years.

            Two hands immediately shot up into the air, belonging to a mischievous pair of Gryffindors.  The Professor didn’t know them well enough to be wary, so he called on the blonde immediately.  “Yes, Miss Fletcher.”

            “Why is it called a charm?” she asked, putting her hand down.

            “Instead of a spell?” the redhead added, putting her own hand down.

            “And why is it called a curse?” the blonde added.

            “Well, Miss Fletcher,” Professor Flitwick started to answer, totally taken aback by the randomness of the question, which he had never been asked before, “A curse denotes a spell which was intentionally designed to harm.”

            “Then is a hex a charm that was intentionally designed to harm?” the redhead asked innocently.

            “And what if the design intention wasn’t harm but it comes to be used that way predominantly?  Can you go from a spell to a hex?” the blonde asked.

            “No, it’s a _charm_ into a hex,” the redhead corrected her friend.

            “Oh, right, sorry, charm then,” the little blonde girl agreed.

            “It’s not necessarily a charm if it becomes a hex-“ Flitwick tried to insert.

            “So they _can_ transform from one to the other!” the redhead cried triumphantly, nudging her friend.  “I totally didn’t believe you.”

            “Yeah, pay up after class,” the blonde told her, then immediately launched into, “so that means it’s a spell into a hex and charm into a curse?”

            “I wouldn’t necessarily say that,” Professor Flitwick tried again to gain control of the classroom discussion.  It would be a few more seconds before he realized that he was out of his depth here and would be for the next seven years.  His only weapon would be making his class too enjoyable to require constant interruption.

            “But then what is it that makes a spell and a hex different from a charm and a curse?” the redhead continue with more questions.

            Before he could begin to answer, the blonde inserted, “Do all spells and charms eventually devolve into hexes and curses?  I mean, anyone can find a way to use a charm maliciously.  Look at the Bubble Incident last week.”

            “Yes, you never know what charms will do.  Are spells different?  Are they more potent or have more integrity?”

            “Whoa, are you calling charms liars?” the blonde asked.  “I think claiming superiority for one is ridiculous.  After all, they can both turn into a hex or a curse.”

            “Yes, but a curse is worse, right, Professor?”

            They turned to the Professor again to see him laughing – hard.  So hard, in fact, that he fell off of the stool he used to reach the chalkboard.  In that state of confusion, class ended.

            In the corridor, the entire class thanked the girls for so thoroughly distracting Professor Flitwick that he had forgotten to assign them homework.  They were less amused after the next class when they had sat through a very long lecture about the minute differences between spells, charms, hexes, and curses.

            It didn’t discourage the dynamic duo from pulling similar stunts over the next seven years.  In fact, it could only be said to encourage the two best friends to plague and tease the Charms professor more.  Luckily, he only liked them the better for it.

 

One Week Earlier

 

            “Are you sure we should be turning on each other like this?” Lily asked somewhat warily even as she set the final preparations in order.  “It’s bound to weaken our team.”

            “I think that Marissa will be good-natured about it,” Remus said.  “If so, it may only lead to a swifter resolution.”

            “I forgot,” Lily said, looking down at Remus Lupin sympathetically.  “It must be hard for you, living in the same room as our sworn enemies.”

            “I just think we should all be redirecting our efforts, I suppose,” Remus replied, “perhaps to Slytherins or the teachers rather than our own House.”

            “And attacking a member of our House helps that goal how?” Lily asked as she swung herself down from the ladder she had used to set up the bucket of Bertie Bott’s Exploding Bubblegum Balls above the door from which Marissa would soon enter.

            Remus shrugged.  “She started it.  Maybe I’m just too much of a believer in poetic justice.  I think pranking her may end it.”

            “I’m not sure that’ll work out,” Lily replied, “but I’m actually having fun with it, so I’m good either way.  By the way, where _were_ you last night?  The boys seemed to think you were off plotting with us.”

            “I don’t have to spend every moment plotting with you, do I?”

            “Easy, Remus, you could have just said you were procuring the bubble gum.”

            “How do you know I wasn’t?”

            Unluckily, the bucket chose this moment to totter over the edge – even without the door opening.  “No!” Lily and Remus both screamed as the Bubblegum balls fell to the floor, where the Bubbles Charm was activated and they not only exploded but poured sugary (although thankfully not horribly sticky) flavored bubbles into the hallway, sweeping the two eleven year olds off their feet.

            They were still struggling around in them when Marissa threw the doors open caroling, “All right, what’s our prank?” and the waist-high bubbles immediately started to spill out into the corridor.

            Marissa, who had managed to keep her feet by bracing herself against the door, started laughing wildly when she saw Remus and Lily emerge, floundering from the river of bubbles.  “They’re slipping, they only got two out of three this time,” Marissa gloated, still laughing almost uncontrollably.

            Lily and Remus exchanged a quick glance and decided not to tell her the truth.

 

            _How did Remus and I get from there to that scene by Marissa’s grave?  How did I let their smiles turn sinister in my mind?  How did this happen?  How did it all slip away?_

_We lost everything.  Voldemort stole Hogwarts, those almost unbearably happy Hogwarts days, from us.  He stole our friendship.  He stole the prank war and the smaller outbreaks that followed it.  He stole thousands of late nights, chatting and gossiping.  He stole hours crying on each other’s shoulders and hours making each other laugh until we cried.  He stole a partnership, forged in the shadow of disease.  He stole understanding.  Peter stole it too.  He who knew how precious those days, those memories, those times were.  He broke them.  He betrayed them.  And I didn’t see it._

_You did.  How did you hold on to them through all that we’ve suffered?  All that we’ve fought for?  I thought you didn’t fight, but the Lupins lost more, gave more, than any of us.  How did you hold on to all that we had been when even we were ripping it away from you?_

_How is it that even on your deathbed, to which I refused to come, in your eyes I was just as I have always been?  How is it that in your eyes I am still a friend?  In your eyes, I was still worth dying for._

_You taught me everything that I’ve ever known about loyalty and love.  I don’t know how I could have thought you would betray me.  I don’t know why it was something so small that could let me believe you, trust you, again.  You died trying to protect me.  If any of the Potters get out of this alive, it is only because of what the Lupins have sacrificed.  You would have called that price cheap, even after everything we did to you._

_In your eyes, I am still your friend._


	9. Voldemort: The Reason I Killed You

**Chapter Eight**

**The Reason I Killed You**

_In your eyes, I am death._

 

            That was true of every man, woman and child that Lord Voldemort had ever killed.  The power that came from that rush of fear in the last moment was beyond any other he had ever felt.  Perhaps it was in the moment before death that wizards were most powerful.  Lord Voldemort would never have to find out.  It was enough that he could force that power to come into him with each of his executions.  Especially in the creation of a horcrux.

            Of course, there was no pain like having your soul divided in two and ripped from your body – those agonizing moments when your brain was still aware of the soul affixed within the unmoving object that could barely contain it before it finally separated that ancient tie.  But there was tremendous power in pain.  Fools like Dumbledore thought that the greatest power was in happiness – in his absurd cheerfulness – when in reality great power came only through pain.  Great power was found only in pain.  What else could provoke the soul to move beyond the bounds of its body and take up residence in a place of safety?  What else could summon enough power to transform the self and gain new power?  Through what else could men be dominated and enemies vanquished?  Only in pain – yours and theirs intermingling fresh, raw and potent.  There was a dark, inescapable beauty in such things that giddy fools like Dumbledore would never appreciate.

            So much the better.

            It was also what the Potters did not understand.  They thought that their victories, their escapes, caused him nothing but embarrassment and anger.  They were wrong.  It caused him pain.  Pains to restore his image with his followers and the masses, pains to ensure their eventual capture, pain when they attacked him and managed to break through his shields, and pain when he thought of them alive and audaciously happy.  And the pain made him stronger with every second that he felt it.  The pain eroded his weaknesses and stupidities.  Pain was his teacher, and the Potters were paying for his lessons with this rigorous instructor – the only one that mattered.

            It was too bad, really, that it was time for them to die.  Oh well.  The pain in others was useful as well.  He had used others’ pain for as long as he could remember – long before he had known how to channel it magically.  And the Potters’ deaths would likely be powerful beyond any that he had enjoyed in years.  It had been too long since he killed personally and too long since he felt the literally soul-shattering pain of creating a horcrux.  He needed this final lesson to be complete.

            The interview with Pettigrew was not nearly so useful.  He had quickly and easily plundered all of the pain in Pettigrew only a few weeks into his service.  He was a dark, bitter, twisted soul more damaged with every second of his service.  He should have been a constant source of power and darkness on which his master could feed, but Pettigrew was too weak.  He was nothing more than a sniveling coward who would do whatever he was told to avoid a zap of the Cruciatus Curse.  He had never learned how to use the pain.  Contempt was dangerous, and Pettigrew inspired nothing but contempt.

            The weakling had been clever enough to make himself the Potters’ Secret Keeper, however.  Perhaps there was something that Lord Voldemort had not seen.  He doubted it.  Plotting was certainly a skill, but when you were already trusted so deeply betraying was not a remarkable achievement.  Getting them to trust you when they should know better, now that was impressive.  Like that blonde of Malfoy’s…it was little wonder Dumbledore had found such subtle uses for her…

            Well, she certainly didn’t matter any longer.  Soon neither would the Potters.

            There was something about a surprise attack…ambushing the enemy (well, not technically ambushing as he was going alone, but with such a One it might as well be a hundred to two) where he thought that he was safe, his home base…the heart of what he thought he could protect.  Then of course there was the fact that it was all for a child.  He had been almost disappointed when his competition with the Potters had become all about some silly brat, demoting his struggle with two people who, when together, were his near equals – at least of Tom Riddle if he had not undergone the transformation to make him Lord Voldemort – had been an unfortunate loss.  But he had miscalculated the zeal and fervor that the Potters would show in protecting their child.  He had expected them to stop their daring offensive, become more conservative in their elaborate and dangerous shadow games.  Instead, they had taken their aggressive efforts to unforeseen levels.

            If Pettigrew hadn’t interfered to distract them they might have been remarkable adversaries indeed.  Oh the pain and the power that he could have extracted from them when their final end came – not like now, ambushing them in hidden places known only to a weakling.  This was an ignoble end for such a pair – however dramatic it would be.  But that was appropriate in a way too.  The Potters deserved every punishment – even an unglorified death.  In the end, even they would be faceless traitors in the face of the great Lord Voldemort.

            He was going to enjoy their first scream of dismay.

            It was half for that first scream of dismay and terror that Voldemort had ordered every Death Eater to surround Godric’s Hollow tonight.  They were not to interfere, but they were to cover any attempt to escape with the brat, forming an inescapable net to catch his most entertaining, intriguing enemies.  The Potters would have to stay and face him, and all of his Death Eaters would witness this proof – which he should never have needed to show them – that the Potters were no different than the thousands of others who had died at his hands.  They would not escape him this time.

 

\---

 

            For once, they had been simply silent and grim.  They did not cower.  They stood with straight backs, but not ready to die.  He was used to the martyrs.  These two fools thought that they could win, or at least escape.  They had steeled their way through the fear not by accepting their defeat but by defying death and Lord Voldemort himself to catch them.

            It had made him laugh aloud.

            And the brave little bitch made it stick in his throat.  Now there would have been an ignoble end indeed – the great Lord Voldemort choking on his own laughter!

            That was when he understood why these young start-ups had bested so many of his Death Eaters.  They dueled with nothing that the old wizards – set in their ways back endless generations like all the inferior pureblood families – had ever seen before.  Probably no one had ever seen them before.  This couple was using curses of their own design, being inventive and even making up new twists and innovations on the spot.

            It had been so long since he had been tested intellectually like this.  When had it been that he had last had to think during an exam at Hogwarts?  Third year?  His “studies abroad” had certainly been challenging, and reading between the lines of Slughorn’s lessons had always been fruitful.  But taking over the wizarding world had been surprisingly devoid of a purely intellectual challenge.

            He was going to enjoy this.

            But even the few seconds spent musing over this had cost him.  The redhead had rolled along the ground to the side so that he couldn’t take both of them in at once.  A moment later a bright blue shield flared around both her and the man.  Lord Voldemort hesitated slightly, not sure what enhancements and innovations the woman might have added – visible in the milky rather than translucent texture of the web of bright blue light that formed the protective shield.  Ah yes, his Death Eaters had told him that the woman was a master of Shielding.

            When a burst of orange light came flying at him – faster than he had ever seen a curse move – Voldemort understood part of the deception.  Someone with the redhead’s mastery of Shielding would be able to disguise her innovations as an ordinary spell.  The milky texture was to disguise the young man’s movements when he attacked.

            More to test the strength and character of the shields than to destroy them, Voldemort fired a moderately powerful Dark curse in its direction.  A common fundamental flaw of his opponent’s innovations was often that they dared not cast the Dark magic necessary to test their spells’ durability against the Darkness.

            The redheaded woman’s shield (the one surrounding the scrawny man) did not cause Voldemort’s spell to bounce back onto him or even deflect to the side or ceiling as he would have expected.   Instead, the shield contracted slightly, turning the blood red color of the burst of light.  After a few seconds, just when Voldemort was convinced he could decipher a way to implode the shield upon itself, the light burst off in every direction at once – a tremendous force even greater than his own in casting it, and now the curse was attempting to push Voldemort back and unbind him.  He was winded, but he did not budge an inch.  He could sense their fear now.  They did not see any of his momentary distress.  They saw only that he overcame it without giving way.

            “You’ll have to do better than that, I’m afraid,” he told them with a sneer.  “Unfortunately, you’re out of time.”  Then he began to fire, attack after attack, a few minor curses in succession was enough to determine that the shield could not withstand a constant barrage.  To return the curse in that fashion it needed those few seconds’ pause.  He would not give it that.  The spell also had to be different – and a different color – or the effect would simply build on itself.  Once the principle was uncovered, it was a relatively simple matter to exploit the flaw.  That was the way with all magic and magical puzzles.  They were only impossible until their secret was revealed.  Then they were simply a matter of overcoming the wit of the caster with persistence and power.

            The problem that only occurred to him after a few moments was that, as he tackled the Shield, the two fools were hidden from his view and free to gather their counterattack.  So, the entire business with the shield had been simply their way of allowing themselves enough time to prepare an assault.  Clever.  They weren’t delusional, which was refreshing though annoying.  They didn’t seriously think that a protection spell, however complex, could stop him in a head-on conflict.

            After thirty seconds (and forty curses in succession), the shield popped like a bubble and the curses splattered in a thousand toxic directions like a potion that boiled over.  Both the man and Lord Voldemort waved the deadly drops away from themselves calmly.

            The fact that the woman was not where she should be hit him just before her attack struck from behind.  Before he could recover his surprise – and annoyance – the man had thrown the full weight of his (indeed) considerable power behind what was (laughably) obviously the most powerful spell that he knew.

            Lord Voldemort allowed the pain to flow through him, welcoming it, letting it grow strong within him.  He welcomed their mingled terror and sense of triumph.  This was his great secret.  This was why he would never be beaten by these oh so clever adversaries.  He could use even a setback, even an apparent defeat.  It only made him stronger.  His victims’ pain or his own, it did not matter in the end.  Both were his tools.

            But he was tired of playing their game.  It was time to force them to play his.

            Lord Voldemort flung out his arms and both fools went sprawling in opposite directions, landing hard against the wall with sickening thuds and staying there with their feet dangling off the ground, their necks choked by invisible hands that his brute strength could not claw away and her shields could not block.  He tightened and waited for the sound of their windpipes cracking.

            He felt what the man would do a second too late to stop him.  With an almighty crumbling sound, the wall against which the woman was penned came tumbling down, throwing her backwards a few feet into the next room but freeing her from his grip.  Even when he had sensed the man’s intent, he had been prepared for the man to use it to free himself.  He must stop thinking of these fools as rational.

            Lord Voldemort barely had the chance to tighten his hold on her husband before the woman had smashed the window in the room now joined to theirs.  Then she banished herself and her husband through it at a speed too quick for him to follow – still linked into the spell so tightly that he could not respond instantly when it was broken.

            They had Apparated away before he could stop them.

 

\---

 

            That first encounter had been a wash, but it was the closest that he had come to defeat except at the hands of Dumbledore until that moment.  Their second encounter had been a victory, but they would have no more after tonight.

            After tonight the legends, mostly false, that rose around their almost single-handed recapture of Diagon Alley from his clutches would fade.  It was only after this feat that the tale of their first escape circulated.  It was then that Potters went from an annoyance to a humiliation.

 

\---

 

            His Death Eaters had secured the area before his arrival.  Of course, they were hidden.  To the crowd bustling about on their pitiful little errands, it would appear that he had arrived, in supreme consciousness of his superiority, unaccompanied.  He looked as if he had simply decided, on a whim, that since he could take Diagon Alley any time he wanted, now would do quite well.  It was precisely the impression he had hoped for, and he could see it in their eyes.  Perhaps Malfoy would be truly useful after all if he could manage this without any embarrassing hitches.

            Looking back on the affair, the most impressive thing to Lord Voldemort would not be that they had discovered that his true purpose was to reveal his prearranged takeover of Gringotts or that they had somehow, in less than half an hour, managed to convince the goblins not to sign the contracts.  It would not even be that they had created the cover of breaking the Imperius Curse on the goblins.  The most impressive thing to Lord Voldemort would be how those bleeding hearts had managed not to come outside and save the shrieking bystanders instead of concentrating on the most important goal.  It was one of the first times that exploiting that weakness in his opponents had not been effective.

            Then again, perhaps they thought Dumbledore had sent other operatives who, if they didn’t have the matter well in hand, would at least be doing all that they could.  Perhaps they were more afraid of him than during their last encounter.

            But there had been no fear in their faces or in those of the veritable army of goblins that came and stood outside of Gringotts and regarded him calmly.  The rage that had bubbled into him then had made him strong, but the knowledge that it could not make him strong enough to force his way into Gringotts against the will of the entire GoblinNation was the true pain – and that was what forged him into a stronger wizard in the months following it.

            That and hatred of the Potters who had taken away his victory.

            But he had also taken away a secret victory from that encounter.  As he ordered his Death Eaters away in fury, he noticed a nervous little man on the right side of the redhead spring forward to help a young blonde woman who was about to trip going up the stairs.  It was Malfoy’s obsession.  Lord Voldemort had not thought much of her or Malfoy’s insistence that she was a spy.

            He had let Malfoy leak a few minor missions to her to see if she took the bait.  Nothing.  Malfoy had not been satisfied – prattling on about how she was not stupid enough to miss the references and how the fact that she didn’t save the victims proved she had a larger mission to protect with her calculated silence.

            Seeing the small brown package in her hand just as she passed into the protection of the goblins (followed by the rest of the survivors of Diagon Alley at her heels), Lord Voldemort understood that she was a much more useful and dangerous tool in the hands of Albus Dumbledore.   She was a neutral agent – the kind he could trust to bring the Philosopher’s Stone to Gringotts without asking questions or being suspected by his Death Eaters.  And she might even be sniffing for information and have more self-control than Malfoy credited to her.

            Rage at having had the Stone in the crowd with him all the while washed over him in exquisite pain, but it gave way to the sight of the nervous little operative helping the blonde up the stairs.  Malfoy’s girl would never turn – Malfoy was quite right about that, Lord Voldemort could see even from that glance at a distance – but that little nervous one looked like he wanted to be anywhere but there at that moment.  Perhaps he should send someone to offer him an alternative destination.

 

\---

 

            Pain and anger, the Potters had caused him, but even their greatest victory had led Lord Voldemort to still greater power.  And to Peter Pettigrew, who had proved more useful than he would have dreamed at the time.  So even in their defeat of him, the seeds of their own death had been planted.  It was only further proof that their death was inevitable and Lord Voldemort was unstoppable.

            And their child would be no different.  It could never have been the Longbottoms, who were so proud and ready to martyr themselves whenever they met him.  It only could have been the Potters, who had always faced him as if they had no intention of dying.  Only the child of two such as that, not the child of these dime a dozen martyrs who couldn’t even manage to get that right, could ever be supposed to be a threat to him.  Well, Lord Voldemort would take their hope now.  And his immortality would be complete.

            The only victory over him that the Potters’ brat would have would be the one he had had within his mother’s womb.

 

\---

 

            Truthfully, Lord Voldemort had felt nothing but frustration.  Frustration that his Death Eaters had failed to eliminate Black – failed even to find him – and forced him to correct their incompetence.  It was fuel only to his annoyance with the incompetent _Muggles_ when he saw that the Potters had arrived on the scene.

            Their business with Regulus Black was, at first glance, simply a misguided effort on behalf of his brother.  They obviously had no idea what the boy had done when he tried to leave.  Then again, Lord Voldemort did not know the extent of the boys treachery at the time either.

            Executing Black was laughably easy.  The boy was another of the oh-so-brave martyrs who gave up the ghost.  He didn’t even bother to fight back.  Those were becoming more and more common among his personal victims.  Killing would almost have become boring if it weren’t for the raw fear and power to be extracted from even the weakest in those final moments.

            But the Potters could always be counted on to liven these things up.

            Not that they arrived in time to save Black.  They seemed only interested in recovering his body.  Did they truly think that his brother would want it?  Well, they had always been delusional.

            Dispatching the husband was, while not precisely the work of a moment, mostly a matter of striking before his wife could put her shield up again after being blindsided by a tricky spell of his own.  Lord Voldemort had actually been brushing up on his spells and thinking creatively to better counter this couple.  He was enjoying playing with them, letting them think that he was playing their game, letting them think that they were better at it than he was.  It was vastly amusing.

            With the husband sprawled near Black’s body – not dead, but injured – the wife fell predictably to pieces.  Truthfully, Lord Voldemort had hoped for and almost expected better from Lily Potter.  Shrugging his shoulders at what he could not change (and wouldn’t if he could), Lord Voldemort raised his wand and fired at Lily Potter as she bent worriedly over her husband.

            “ _PROTEGO!_ ”she cried, rising to her feet.  Her voice seemed to reverberate through the hollow shack in which Regulus Black had tried to hide and even shake it’s foundations.  As it did so, a blast of blue light repelled his spell back onto its source.  Any other wizard would have been blown back or perhaps even into a thousand pieces.

            For one brief moment, Lord Voldemort was frightened.  He had never seen such raw power in this woman.  The fear made him stronger.  It also made him think.

            “You cannot have him,” Lily Potter said, sounding as strong and empowered as if she were an Amazon queen.  What was not quite so clear was who she meant.  Not that it mattered to the spectacular delivery of the line.

            Lord Voldemort just laughed, his high cruel laugh.  Lily Potter did not flinch.  His face twisted into an unfamiliar expression: a smile.  “Ah, Mrs. Potter, just when are you due?  You can’t be more than two months along…which makes it neatly at the beginning of August…or rather the end of July.”

            “You will not pass through me,” she said just as powerfully, but Lord Voldemort could see the surprise and fear in her eyes.  He wondered if she knew what that meant.

            “Treasure this moment, Mrs. Potter,” he told her, and the venom in his voice would poison an elephant at a hundred paces.  “It will be the last time that you will see Lord Voldemort walk away.  The next time, I will have your head.”  Then he laughed again, “or better yet, I’ll have your little one’s head.”

            Then, as if the air had closed in around him and swallowed him, he disappeared and left these cursed Potters to _have_ Black’s worthless body.  He was already dead.

            It was not until months later that Lord Voldemort learned the depth of the Potters’ final victory over him.

 

\---

 

            It was little comfort that the Potters had not known that their victory was significant.  It was little comfort that they had never known how cleverly they had tricked him.  It was little comfort even that the one who might have known the vital stakes being played out that night was dead – taking the knowledge with her.  It was little comfort because it did not reclaim his lost horcrux.

            But it didn’t really matter.  After tonight, the ceremony would be complete and he would have eternity to find the place where Black or Lupin had hidden it.  He would handle it personally, of course.  No one – not even his most honored and trusted Death Eaters – knew his plans.  That was the only way to keep them from meddling fools like Dumbledore.  That and beginning when he was young, before he gained great power.  When no one was watching.  The fools.

            Now he had the power he always knew that he would.  Soon he would be unstoppable.  Then he would not even have to risk facing his most powerful enemies.  He could simply wait them out.  The likes of Dumbledore were weak enough to let themselves grow old and die, leaving no one to carry on their work.  Lord Voldemort had never had that problem.

            And he never would.

            That was the thought that occupied the parts of Lord Voldemort’s mind that weren’t probing the house for spies or traps and analyzing his plan of attack.  With almost a smile on his face, Lord Voldemort approached the front door of the small house in Godric’s Hollow to meet what would be his final encounter with Lily and James Potter.  In a way, it was almost a shame.

             He heard strange sounds wafting from the small room where Pettigrew said the Potters sometimes watched television.  Lord Voldemort’s grin twisted.  He remembered television.  His first accidental magic had been changing the channel so that he could watch something besides the educational nonsense that the orphanage allowed them to show.

            From the sound of it, the Potters were watching something similar to what he had managed to stumble upon years ago.  Lord Voldemort paused, almost annoyed when he heard the sleepy voice of Lily Potter interrupt the chase sequence.  “Have a bad dream, darling?”

            “Mm,” he mumbled intelligently.

            “Well, it’s no wonder, considering we fell asleep in the middle of a horror marathon,” she said, sounding amused and barely awake herself.  With a click, the sounds from the television switched off.

            Well, this promised to be a highly disappointing show from the fabulous duo.  It was almost a shame, really, that their end would be so ignoble.  He might even have to be creative in order to make this evening interesting.

            “Is that thing still on?” James Potter mumbled, “I swear, the way some of those Muggle villains skulk around it sounds just like the swish of a cloak.  Then they do the slow footsteps bit, it’s all so overdrama-“

            “James!” his wife hissed, sounding abruptly awake.  Her husband sat up as well.  Well, reenacting the clichés of horror movies had at least gotten their attention.  Now he could perhaps have some entertainment before the inevitable end.

            Just for effect, he let the door click open and swing ominously on its hinges.  Usually Lord Voldemort felt no need to set the scene, but it definitely had its uses.

            A moment later, James Potter appeared in the door.  “Lily!  It’s him!  Take Harry and go!”  He drew his wand and fired his first spell, a clever little blocking maneuver that barely stopped Lord Voldemort in his slow forward progress, taking possession of the Potter’s home.  “I’ll hold him off!” Potter promised despite the obvious evidence to the contrary.

            A flash of red hair disappearing up the stairs proved that his wife was as oblivious as he was to the fact that James Potter would never be a match for Lord Voldemort.  Why in the world would they have split up?  Did they not even have the brains to figure out that they were strongest when they fought together?  Well, apparently parenthood made people stupid.  Their brat was crying.  That obviously would impair their judgment.  Another thing Lord Voldemort would luckily never have to worry about.

            He would have liked to play with Potter, especially since this would be the last time – one of the last times he would ever have an adversary challenge him quite likely.  But since his wife had decided to run, he would have to dispatch him quickly and catch up to her.  He didn’t have time for a merry chase designed by that strange, creative woman, and it would make a better show to his Death Eaters if their net was not needed.  And there was always the chance that she could outsmart _them_ as she had so often before.

            “ _Imperio_.” Lord Voldemort cast as soon as he had a firm lock on the man’s position.  The Imperius Curse was difficult to aim but nearly impossible to miss.  The moment that the spell left the wand of the caster, it locked onto the mind of the intended victim.  “ _Run for your life._ ”

            Of course James Potter would defeat the curse.  He had plenty of presence of mind.  Even though most would be thrown by the order to do something that, not so deep down, he wanted to do very much, Lord Voldemort knew that James Potter would not obey him.  Truthfully, he hadn’t wanted him to listen to his command.  He didn’t want power over James Potter’s actions.

            All he wanted was to distract the wily wizard long enough to properly aim the Killing Curse, a much more difficult spell to cast and aim.  Of course, it would be.  It was, after all, impossible to block.

            Lord Voldemort absorbed his fear in his final moment, then raced up the stairs after the dead man’s wife and child.  He didn’t have time to properly absorb James Potter’s death.  That was too bad, but Lord Voldemort couldn’t let his wife get away.

            It would be most annoying to have to track her down.

            “ _Portus_ ,” he heard the woman whisper.  He made directly for the room, before the woman could send her child through the Portkey.  “Don’t cry darling,” she murmured, “you’ll be safe with Remus.”

            As he reached the door, the toy Snitch left the clutching hands of the infant and floated into his own hand.  There was a moment of panic and annoyance at himself for allowing himself to make such a mistake.  If this had been a typical trick of the woman’s – and a brilliant one at that – he would have been sent to the middle of the Adriatic Sea with one wave of her wand.  However, she was, for the split second she would have had to do so, surprised by his appearance and in her own state of panic.

            Then the toy Portkey was nothing but ashes in his right hand.  A second time, Lord Voldemort cast a Summoning Charm and the child was ripped out of his mother’s arms.  With a desperate cry of grief, the woman launched herself forward and snatched her child out of the air, rolling to protect him from the fall she took directly afterwards.

            With an annoyed sigh, Lord Voldemort cast the Imperius Curse.  “ _Give me the child_ ,” he commanded, placing his whole weight and power upon the curse.

            Even so, he wasn’t particularly surprised when he heard, a respectable pause later, “Not Harry!  Not Harry!  Please, not Harry!”

            “ _Stand aside, you silly girl.  Stand aside now!_ ”  Lord Voldemort had had enough of these silly girls who stood up to him when they should cower.

            Years later he would target female opponents more ardently than any other, save his primary mark, because of the strength that he saw in Lily Potter, Marissa Fletcher, and the many others who had stood before him and outsmarted him in ways that their male counterparts could not.

            “Not Harry, please not Harry!  Take me, kill me instead!  Please, have mercy!”

            At that, Lord Voldemort stopped dead.  “Mercy?” he repeated, then cackled, “Mercy!”  A flash of light from his wand bound the woman’s hands above her head, forcing her to drop her child, who zoomed into his arms.  “Do you still not know the truth?  The truth is that you were always dead.  But I will be merciful,” he told the woman as she struggled desperately with the now multiple bonds that held her.  He wished her luck breaking them.  “I will kill you first.  A mother need not watch her child die.”

 

_In your eyes, I wanted to see despair.  You did not disappoint me.  I knew then that your death would be perhaps the most powerful that I had experienced._

 

            “ _Avada Kedavra!_ ”

            When the flash of green light settled, the woman’s body went limp.  That was the only way that Lord Voldemort knew that she had died.  The surge of power from her final moment did not flood through him.  For a moment, he held the screaming child in front of him.  Then he slammed the child onto the ground.  “ _Avada Kedavra!_ ” he cried, then spread his arms for the rush of power from the creation of his final horcrux.  He wondered if it would be even more painful, wrenching and incredibly powerful as the previous five.

            When there was nothing, Lord Voldemort knew what had happened.

            Then the rage flooded through him.  With an inarticulate scream of pure fury, a wave of destruction flew out of both of his hands and slammed into two of the walls of the room, blasting them apart along with the walls in the rooms past them until the night was visible through the gaping holes.  He didn’t need to hear the muffled cry to know that the Potters were still alive.

            “Where are you?” he shouted up towards the ceiling which a moment later wrenched itself apart from the rest of the house, along with the rest of the roof, and flew off into the night.  “I know you’re here!  You can’t sustain an astral projection from far away, not an adaptive one!”

            Yet another blast erupted from him, without him even having to will the destruction, and this one shot green flames that caught along the wall and quickly turned into a blaze of his fury at having been tricked.  “Only, how _did_ you manage little _Harry’s_?” he practically cooed, the destructive actions cooling his initial rage enough for him to channel it into something more directly constructive.

            “My, my, what interesting allies you would have made,” he hissed.  “But you chose the fool’s route.”  With a more strategically placed blast, meant to reveal them hiding in the walls, Lord Voldemort caused the house to start to lean inward.  The walls would not last long.  Surely the Potters would realize that.  That and the collapse of their trap would shake them and prevent them from coming up with another clever trick.

            “You never understood the other side of magic,” he explained their fundamental flaw to them with utmost patience.  “So you didn’t know that I would know if I had truly killed you, from the rush of power and fear.  You were too afraid of being corrupted to even study your opponent properly.  That is why you were always destined to fail.  You never knew your enemy.”

            A well-aimed blast tore open only the front of a wall which usually would have blasted straight through the entire house.  Lord Voldemort smiled.  They had obviously moved at the last moment, but he had found where they had been hiding to fool him.  Now that he had opened it, he could call the child to him.

            “ _Accio!_ ” he cried aloud, needing his full power and strength to overcome the protections that that woman would undoubtedly have placed on her child.  He came, more slowly than he should have but just as surely, into the Dark Lord’s arm.  “A fatal misstep,” he laughed.

            “ _Avada-_ “

            “NO!” a flash of red hair appeared momentarily at the hole he had created.

            “Lily!”

            “ _Kedavra!_ ” Lord Voldemort finished triumphantly.  However, the child was no longer in his hands and the flash of red hair was a woman who had crumbled to the ground.  Harry Potter was not dead, but rather screaming into the night air.

 

_In your eyes, I expected to see fear at last.  I excepted you to look me in the eyes and give me anything that I wanted to leave you alone.  But it wasn’t there, and I knew that even as I killed you there could only ever have been that same look of defiance in your eyes._

 

            “ _Avada Kedavra!_ ” Lord Voldemort shouted in fury, pointing hastily in the direction of James Potter who had already mustered a desperate attack on him.

            The attack that had escaped before Potter’s death actually knocked Voldemort from his feet and cost him several seconds of pain to fling off the effects.  He welcomed the pain and relished it, but was furious that it interfered with the reception of James Potter’s power as well.  He could feel it, however.  Potter had known he was going to die, had thrown the power of his last moment into that curse.  He arose, panting and clutching his chest, only a moment later.

            He shook himself and ignored the weakness in his arms.  It was already dissipating.

            With the true father fallen to the ground, followed by one of the remaining rafter beams alight with the Dark Lord’s vengeful flames, Lord Voldemort wrenched the bawling brat out of his foolish mother’s arms.  She could have escaped if she had let the brat die.  He wouldn’t have pursued them.  Not for days at any rate – plenty of time to hide themselves away to lick their wounds and plot revenge.  They would have made a merry amusement and the annoyance and frustration that they caused him had increased his power exponentially.

            Instead their child would make him immortal, so that he would not need to acquire more power so quickly.  He would have eternity to build more slowly what the Potters had given him so rapidly.  He would never be content to have missed Lily Potter’s death rush or been denied using James Potter’s for himself, however.  When he felt the pain convert once more to strength, when the rush of that power beyond any other had reached its climax, he fired the Killing Curse for the final time for thirteen years.

            The pain was greater than he had expected even for his final horcrux.  The wrenching of his soul out of his body was a violent, unthinkably painful process to which he had never, nor would ever, become accustomed.  Not that he would need to any more.

            It took several beats to realize that his soul was looking down on his body, which had crumbled to the ground.  That was unusual, but it did not bother him overly.  After all, he could be accompanying the departing piece of soul rather than the one to remain in his body.  Sacrifices must be made, certainly.

            Then he heard the brat start to cry.  In shock, he started down and saw two horrifying images at once.  The first was the one year old move as if he were quite alive.  The second was his body dissolve away as if it had never been.

            For a moment, the pain and fury overcame him.  For the second time that night, he lost his sense and gave in to the rage at the Potters.

            Then Lord Voldemort learned a terrible lesson.  He learned, finally, the beauty and danger of the Dark Arts.  No one understood them fully.  No one could control them.  The pain and fury now instead of making him powerful had crippled him.  Pain was a cruel teacher, and it required him to learn from terrible, likely prolonged suffering.

            But it had also sustained him.  He would return, wiser and more subtle than ever, never to underestimate the Dark again.

            Nor the Light, for he knew now that they too could use the final moment before death.  The Light did know that power, and Lily Potter had known how to wield her own death.  He would never forget her look now, as it would torture him for the rest of eternity.  He would remember the bitter lesson he had been taught by this night in Lily Potter’s moment of death.

 

_In your eyes, I am defeatable._

 

            That was the Potters, delusional right to the end.  From that night he had taken his greatest defeat, but also his greatest lesson – what would become his greatest strength when he returned.  For inevitably, he would return.  And their brat would just as surely die.


	10. Petunia: The Reason I Lie to You

**Chapter Nine**

**The Reason I Lie to You**

 

_In your eyes, I am Lily’s sister._

            Vernon liked to think that Petunia had forgotten or dismissed his sudden interest in her sister and her son Harry.  She hadn’t.  Petunia stayed awake long into the night wondering if Vernon, in turn, had let her believe that he didn’t know that she had talked to Lily barely a week ago.  Was that why he had brought her up?  What did he care, after all, if there were owls and shooting stars on the news?  Was he angry that she hadn’t told him?  Did he want to know what her sister had said?  Did he want a promise that it would never happen again?

            Not for the first time in their marriage, Petunia turned on her side and faked the heavy, rhythmic breathing that would convince her husband – still lying awake – that she had fallen asleep.  She needed more time to think about this before she talked to Vernon, and he showed no signs of dropping off himself.

            Petunia tried to think about what to tell her husband, how she would do damage control if he was furious, how she would keep Dudley from repeating, “Harry!” in his presence the way he had this afternoon, and all of the things she would have to sort out to get her own family back to normal.  However, as she lay there she caught herself time and again worrying about Lily’s family instead.  What if Vernon had heard something about Lily and didn’t want to bring it up?  Having sworn off her sister as she had, would anyone actually tell her if Lily were hurt?  Or dead?  What if something had happened to her sister?  Why did Petunia still, after all this time, care?

            Involuntarily, Petunia shivered.  Convinced she had given herself away, she spent several tense seconds before she recognized Vernon’s genuine snores.  But Petunia could not relax in relief, not when she could almost hear Lily’s desperate pleas for her help, her proud sister falling at her feet.  There was another sound ringing in her ears in the silence of her house as well – the sound of a woman and baby screaming.  She shook and pulled the covers tighter around her.  Danger always felt cold to Petunia Dursley.  It always had.

 

 *~*

 

            Petunia’s first living memory was cold.  The first thing she remembered feeling was ice cold air that froze her lungs and felt like it would stop her heart.  Just when it had seemed unbearable, there was a flash of white light and the cold slowly receded.  The pain, however, never fully left her chest.

            She had been four years old at the time.  When Lily, Petunia and their mother Marigold were brought to the hospital, it was determined it was probably the shock that wiped her memory clean.  Lily, six years old at the time, refused ever to discuss what had happened, so what she remembered or didn’t remained a mystery for years.  The true loss of memory and mind, however, was concentrated in the third patient.

            Petunia’s memory loss was not considered a shattering loss – how much do most people remember of their first four years of life anyway? – until they realized that it meant she would not have the slightest memory of what her mother was like before her mind had shattered.  Marigold Evans never recovered from the attack, mystifying the doctors and specialists who consulted on her case.  Petunia could never recall a single moment of the golden, blessed time her father and sister referred to as “normal,” imploring plaintively of every new specialist when things would return to normal.

            Another unexpected side effect of Petunia’s memory loss was that the first definition that Petunia was given of herself was, “Lily’s sister.”  Petunia was just waking up when a man in an orange trench coat and a lime green bowler hat walked in with the man she would soon recognize as her father.  He told the strange man, “And this is Lily’s sister, Petunia.  Apparently she lost all of her memory from the shock, but they say that she’ll be fine soon.”

            This might not have been terribly significant if the years to come did not prove that this was, indeed, how a great deal of the world saw her.  Even her father had the unfortunate habit of referring to his girls collectively as, “Lily-Pet,” and often calling them this individually as well.  When he wanted only Lily, he was usually able to catch himself in time to hide the slip.  However, there was a period of two years in which Petunia Evans thought of herself as, “Lily’s pet.”

            Of course, Mr. Evans did not, with his absent-minded slips of the tongue, do nearly the damage on his daughter that her mother inflicted.  She could not precisely be blamed for it.  It was not Marigold Evans’s fault that her mind had shattered and, in the process, erased her younger daughter from her memory.

            Petunia used to think that her mother’s brain must have frozen in that deadly coldness, and she waited eagerly for it to thaw in the first months after the incident.  They all had hope then, hope that they would soon return to normal, a state spoken of and described as if it were heaven itself.  Petunia was eight years old before she understood that “normal” had a different connotation in most of the world.  That was around the same time that she learned in school how frozen objects became fragile, easy to shatter.  That was when she stopped waiting for her mother to wake up.  The horrible cold she still remembered, that she could still feel whenever she touched her mother’s hands, had made her mother’s brain brittle and caused it to break beyond repair.

 

*~*

 

            It wasn’t Lily’s fault that she had been remembered.  It wasn’t Lily’s fault that she was a witch; that she spent the last of her childhood and whole of her adolescence in a magical castle while Petunia spent it in a hospital’s mental ward praying that this time, just this once, her mother would remember her.  It wasn’t Lily’s fault that her child was apparently destined for greatness.  It wasn’t Lily’s fault she had put Petunia and her family in danger.

            Nothing was ever Lily’s fault, but that didn’t make it any easier to be Lily’s sister.

            The worst part was that if something had happened to Lily, it was Petunia’s fault.  The next thought sent another violent shiver down her spine.  If something happened to Lily, it would be exactly what she had, at many points in her life, wanted most.

 

*~*

 

            Despite herself, Petunia had high hopes that her sixth birthday would be the day that it would happen.  She had made a wish on her birthday cake candles, and she knew a child’s hope that it would come true.  Weren’t birthday candles the height of powerful magic that kids could call to their aid?

            “Hello, Mum,” Petunia said brightly as she bounced into her mother’s room, unable to contain her excitement.  “Do you like my pretty dress?”  She whirled around, her skirt billowing around her, and flashed her mother a brilliant smile.  “Daddy helped me pick it out.”

            “It’s lovely, dear,” Marigold said sweetly and Petunia beamed.  So today would be a good day.  Even if her father had only managed to convince Marigold that she existed, and she was merely pretending to remember her, it would be a wonderful day.  Even if it was only because Marigold Evans remembered the little girl who had come to see her so many times, it was going be a good day today.  And Petunia knew, in her heart, that it was none of those lesser miracles; she knew that her wish had worked.  

            Then her mother continued, “But what on earth has your father done to your hair, Lily pie?”

            Petunia couldn’t breathe for almost a full minute.  Tears were in her eyes, and her chest felt nearly as crushed as it had by the awful coldness.  “I’m not Lily pie, mum,” she burst out through her tears.

            “Oh, sweetheart,” her mother cried in dismay at her reaction.  “I know you’re getting too old for that pet name, but you will always be Lily pie to me.”

            With that Petunia burst into full blown sobs.  Her mother reached over and took her in her arms and held her like a daughter for the first time in Petunia’s memory.  Even though Petunia clung to her mother, she felt hollow to know that her mother was only embracing her like this because she thought that she was Lily.  She should have known that it was inevitable.  She was Lily’s age at the time of the accident.  Marigold Evans still knew her elder daughter.

            “I’m sorry I said that about your hair, darling,” Marigold said a long moment later.  “It’s a lovely blonde color, of course, but your red hair was so beautiful.  It reminded me of my sister, your aunt.  I’ve told you all about her, remember?  She was so amazing.  The kind that always seem to die young.  I know your father gets afraid when I talk like this about you, but that’s no reason to dye your hair like that, the ridiculous man.  You look like that horrible hag I call my aunt.”

            “Can’t you just think I’m pretty, mum?” Petunia whispered miserably, looking imploringly up at her mother with every broken-hearted tear she had ever shed in her eyes.

            “Oh, my darling Lily pie, I didn’t mean that you looked horrible,” Marigold said, pulling away to look at her daughter.  “You will always look pretty to me.  You are so beautiful, so precious.  In my eyes, you will always be the most perfect little girl in the world, my Lily pie.”

            “I’m not Lily pie!” Petunia had shouted in anguish and anger, breaking away from her mother’s embrace as tears streamed down her face and she covered her face with her hands.  Her mother made another grab to draw her into her arms, but Petunia dodged out of her way and fled out of the room.

            She heard sounds of a crash as Marigold Evans knocked something over trying to go after her and fell.  Everyone streamed into the room to help her, allowing Petunia to escape.

            Curled up in her favorite hiding spot in the hospital she knew so well by now, Petunia Evans cried until she was too exhausted to cry anymore.  “I’m not Lily,” she whispered quietly over and over again.  “She was supposed to remember _me_.”

            That was the day that Petunia Evans stopped believing in magic.

 

*~*

 

            That’s why it had been doubly cruel to find out, three years later, that magic did exist.  It just didn’t work for everyone.  Just like Marigold Evans had retained part of her memory, just not pieces of everyone she should have loved.

            Everything worked out for Lily.  It wasn’t her fault, but that didn’t make it any easier to be Lily’s sister.  So Petunia was the only thing that didn’t work out for Lily.  Lily’s sister should have agreed to protect her.  Lily’s sister should have been willing to save her, to be her perfectly hidden Secret Keeper.

            But Petunia was not willing to be freezing cold in fear every day of her life just because Lily’s sister should have been willing to help whenever she called – no matter what else stood between them.  Let one thing not work out for Lily.  For half a second let Petunia be Dudley’s mother instead of Lily’s sister.

            None of it was Lily’s fault, but she could have stopped it.  So Petunia wasn’t going to stop it, and it would be her fault.  Lily could have gone with Petunia to help their mother remember both her daughters as one specialist suggested, but she hadn’t come home for the Easter Holidays that year and by the summer their doctors had changed to one who didn’t see the point as much as Petunia did.  Lily could have stopped it when the hospital gave up and moved her mother to that awful mental institution where she had died within the month, but she hadn’t gotten her into St. Mungo’s.  Lily could have stopped her war on whatever evil maniac was terrorizing her world, but she was too stubborn even when it put her son on the line.  Lily could have saved her and her mother from the attack that shattered Marigold Evans’ mind, but she hadn’t known enough to do it in time.

 

*~*

 

            Petunia had been furious when Lily brought that horrible boy to the hospital to meet her mother.  Not because Petunia didn’t think that Marigold Evans deserved to meet the boy who was dating her daughter.  She was furious because her sister had brought the boy she despised only a few months ago, citing mocking others and having respect for no one as his chief faults, to meet her mentally ill mother so soon into the relationship.  Petunia would spend the next ten years hearing about that lovely Potter boy she had come with last time because Lily wanted to bring her boyfriend of three months to meet her.

            She was furious because her mother took to James Potter immediately, chatting with him so animatedly that it was easy, especially to those who dealt with her often, to ignore the fact that it was mostly nonsense that Marigold Evans was speaking about so earnestly.

            Petunia left to get coffee after a few minutes of watching her mother, with whom she could barely have a thirty second significant conversation, chat merrily with a boy she had just met and would, in a month or two when he dumped Lily or she him, mean nothing to her.  She watched from around a corner until she saw Lily and James walking out of the room.  They were both still laughing as Petunia stared at them unseen.

            “Don’t take this the wrong way, Lily,” James said after a moment, “but it’s like reading _The Quibbler_.  Anything I say, she replies, ‘BUT DOES IT?’ and has some perfectly logical, though faulty, alternative explanation and series of conspiracies about it.  I…well…that came out very wrong…”

            “Relax, James,” Lily said, putting up her hand to let him know that it was all right though even Petunia could tell that her mother had just been insulted.  “It’s because she’s a fan.  She’s been reading _The Quibbler_ for years now.  I’ve been bringing her copies when I visit.”

            Petunia nearly screamed out loud in fury and frustration.  Lily had been _what?_   How in the world were the doctors – not to mention Petunia and her father – supposed to decipher Marigold’s nonsense from Lily’s gibberish now?  How many times had they written her mother off as ridiculous when she was just trying to spout back what Lily had selfishly, stupidly spouted off to her?

            “You’ve been giving her _Quibblers_?” James asked in confusion, pronouncing the word with a contempt that confirmed Petunia’s worst suspicions about his earlier comments.  “Why on earth would you do that?”

            “She found it,” Lily shrugged.  “I brought her the occasional _Daily Prophet_ or _Witch Weekly_ over holidays over the years, but she didn’t really show much interest.  Then one Easter she found that free copy of _The Quibbler_ they were handing out in Hogsmeade in my purse and she just…took to it.  She was always asking about it, wanting another one so I got them for her.  I know it’s, well, it’s a magazine for eccentrics, but it let us talk about the magical world.  Not as it really is, but we’ve never been able to talk about my life as it really is and…”

            “I understand,” James told her kindly, taking both of her hands in his.

            Petunia, on the other hand, was furious.  It wasn’t just that Lily had compromised her recovery or let her start to parrot a magazine that was apparently nutty even by wizarding standards.  It was so _easy_ for Lily, who had given up hope, not to see the problem, not to come here and have a normal conversation.  Of course she could ride the winds of Marigold Evans’s nonsense.  She hadn’t asked for anything better in years.

            “I didn’t mean anything by it, either, Lily,” James told her a moment later, still slightly abashed by his blunder.  Lily didn’t even seem aware of hers.  “The Quibbler is just as entertaining as your mother.  Damn, I mean…I like her.  She’s funny – witty, like you.  And she makes more sense than a lot of people that I know.  Sirius, for example.”  Lily laughed, and Petunia had to restrain herself from sprinting across the corridor and slapping both of them.  “The Ministry for another.”

            “Well, it’s hard to argue with that,” Lily said, moving closer and drawing his arms around her as if she belonged there, in his arms, absolutely.  She stood on tiptoe to give him a kiss on the cheek.

            “To think that they employ the monsters that probably did this to her,” James said seriously, pushing a lock of red hair out of Lily’s face as if it would erase the pain of what he had just said.

            No such luck.  “What do you mean?” Lily asked sharply, sounding as if the slap Petunia longed so much to give her had landed with its full force.

            “Lily, think about it,” James told her.  “What you told me about the attack last week: a sudden cold, everything going dark, the sound of deep, rattling breaths…a flash of a black cloak…reliving your worst memory at the time, a kind of darkness growing inside you…Dementors, Lily.  That’s what makes the most sense.  Especially with that Fudge character being there the moment that it’s all over.  You must have done involuntary magic to save yourself, and it alerted the Ministry.  It was probably a botched Memory Charm that destroyed your sister’s memories.  We didn’t know as much about its effect on children back then.”

            “The Ministry…is employing them?” Lily asked.

            “Dad heard something at work.  Starting soon, they’re going to be guarding Azkaban Prison, to forestall future breakouts.  And keep Voldemort from using them for more dastardly purposes,” James told her.  “I don’t know how you negotiate with a Dementor to propose any of this, and I guess I wouldn’t really want to know.”

            “James, I know when I saw Fudge in the paper last week…do you really think that…if I had just – sooner, then she…”

            “It’s a miracle you survived at all,” James said forcefully.  “It’s a miracle you were able to summon enough of the right kind of power to save yourself and your sister and _yes_ , your mother.  She only lost her mind.  You know what Dementors can do, you know she could have lost her very soul.”

            “Take me home, James,” Lily said quietly.  Just as Petunia mentally made a snide remark about her being the one who drove them to the hospital, James Potter kissed Lily Evans and held her close.  “Thank you,” she whispered a moment later.  Then Petunia realized, through the haze of finding out that she could blame the magical world for literally everything that was wrong with her life, that Lily wasn’t asking to be taken back to the house she occasionally visited on breaks.

            Lucky Lily, yet again.

            Hours later, when Petunia and Lily were sleeping in adjoining twin beds in the room they shared, Petunia whispered, “So these Dementors…that hurt her…can their effects be reversed?”  Both sisters kept their faces buried in their pillows, not looking at each other.

            “No,” Lily whispered in reply.  “But I can ward them off now.  James taught me.”

            “Can you teach me?”

            There was a long pause before Lily replied, so softly that Petunia could barely hear her, “No.”

 

*~*

 

            Petunia was not aware of sleeping.  One minute she was freezing in the dark, then she was freezing in the morning light.  She reached behind her and found the soft depression in the bed that meant that Vernon had only recently woken up.  She rolled into it, almost shocked by the warmth still buried in the large valley made by her husband’s mass in the night.  Petunia lay curled up under the covers there and let the ice cube that was her own body slowly melt in the comforting warmth of her husband.

            Lily had always looked as if she expected Vernon to break Petunia.  Petunia could still read her mind well enough even then.  Well, yes, her husband was rather large.  Petunia was not blind to the fact that she had married a very well-proportioned man, but he was warm.  Lily’s James had warm eyes, she said, but Vernon was warm everywhere.  He had thawed Petunia’s heart, before it had a chance to break.  For all she cared, he could be three thousand pounds as long as he kept her feeling this warm.

 

*~*

 

            Petunia had wandered around aimlessly for almost an hour after hearing who had attacked her mother.  She finally settled in a chair in the Waiting Room with her ice cold coffee still clutched in her hands.  She flopped herself down in the chair and leaned back, abandoning the upright posture that she always practiced.  Ten thousands thoughts whirled through her head at once, competing with each other for prominence.

            She covered her eyes with her free hand, head turned to the side to make this more comfortable, and laughed hollowly because she was too exhausted to cry properly.  A few tears weakly filled her eyes, but it felt as if they had frozen there.

            “Are you all right?” a man asked, casting a slightly cold, large shadow over her.  It was the voice of a gruff man trying to sound gentle.

            Petunia laughed a little harder.  “Oh, I suppose,” she replied, “I’m no different than before, really.”

            “You’re making a scene in the Waiting Room,” he told her with a note of disapproval in his voice.

            “I’m sitting here quietly,” Petunia replied, although she sat up and wiped at her eyes to keep any of the tears from escaping.  He was right about the appearances of the thing.  Everyone here knew her well, and they would wonder what had happened to her mother.  It was indelicate and impolitic to sit here feeling sorry for herself even if her world had just been turned upside down.  Pity and questions from people who could not be allowed to understand would only make it worse, so the less gossip she incited the better.

            “I could feel your distress from across the room,” the man, whom she could now see was very young, perhaps only a year or two older than she was, told her seriously.  Normally, Petunia would have been either flattered by this attention or bothered by the intrusion.  Instead, she was neither.  It felt almost as if this man were claiming the right to be interested in her affairs, even the most intimate ones that led to her crying in a hospital Waiting Room, and she didn’t mind in the least.  Perhaps it was seeing Lily with her James, perhaps it was finding out that she could blame someone – some creatures at least – after all.  Perhaps she was just disoriented and intimidated by the size of him.

            “What are you, a Seer?” she asked sarcastically, laughing darkly at the thought of Lily’s world and its trust in such silly people and things as that.  It wasn’t often that she managed to feel superior to Lily in this hospital, but that was what made these stolen moments so desperate and so desperately needed.

            “No,” the young man said with a vaguely disapproving air that suggested that he hated all things abnormal as much as Petunia did – though he probably used the traditional definition.  “I do, however, make note of the prettiest girl in any room.”

            “Did you just come over here to tell me I look awful, should be quiet, and then flirt with me?” Petunia asked, despite herself impressed with his gall more than annoyed with his imposition.  All thoughts of Charles, whom she was dating at the time, had quite flown out of her head.  Why she could not imagine.  The young man before her had the easy confidence of an older teenager about to move on to the Uni, but that was about the end of the list of traditionally attractive things about him.  He was solidly built – very.  The shadow he cast had been no illusion.  He was straight-laced and meticulously dressed in a rather ridiculous, outlandish school uniform that actually seemed to suit him.  His face was plump but pleasant as it smiled down at her.  He was strong, steady and strangely comforting to Petunia whose world had just been thrown into chaos by a messy-haired, scrawny, undeniably traditionally gorgeous boy.

            “It succeeded in distracting you from whatever is hurting you, didn’t it?” he responded to her mild accusation.  Petunia’s smile grew slightly.  He certainly had.  How, she wasn’t even certain, but he had undeniably.  It was as if he had seen her world tilting off-balance and been large enough and strong enough to hold it in place even for just a moment.  “Vernon Dursley,” he introduced himself, extending his hand.

            She took it without a moment’s pause, comforted by his slightly too-strong grip and almost jarring handshake.  “Petunia Evans,” she told him as she withdrew her pale, delicate white hand from his rough grip almost regretfully.  “Why are you here?”

            “My sister Marge,” Vernon replied, taking the seat next to her, causing her to be crowded close to him.  She didn’t move to put distance between them, however.  “She was caught in that tube station attack.”  Petunia’s hand flew to her mouth as her gasp broke into Vernon’s tale.  “Don’t worry, she wasn’t one of the ones badly hurt.  The doctors say she should be all right,” Vernon assured her.  “We had some very difficult hours, however, when we weren’t so sure.”

            “I’m so sorry,” Petunia told him earnestly.

            “It’s not you who should be ruddy sorry,” Vernon said gruffly, even angrily, though Petunia sensed that she was not his intended target.  “It’s those idiots in government – they should have learned long ago that these people won’t listen to reason.  Hanging’s the only way to deal with ‘em that makes any sense!”  He seemed to physically stop himself and turn to face Petunia once more.  “How about you?”

            “My mother is…more of a lifer,” Petunia said softly.  Then she added more strongly, “She was in an attack as well, and we’re only  just learning who.”  The fury that Petunia felt rose to the surface as she spoke the words.  All these years it had been there, and she had never unleashed it before.  It was easier than the pain, the longing, the loneliness.  It was powerful.

            Vernon grunted his disapproval and anger on her behalf.  With that, Petunia knew that she had found someone, at last, who would always be on her side, who would never hurt her, who could give her the home she had never known.

            So ten minutes later, when he was told he could go in to see his sister, Petunia was quite happy to give Vernon Dursley her phone number.  He already had her loyalty, forever.  It would not be long before he possessed her heart.

            When he called, a respectable two days later, Petunia had made sure she was officially on the market.  Just in case.

 

*~*

 

            Petunia rose as the warmth began to fade, probably in the face of her own stubborn coldness.  She smiled at her husband as she brushed her teeth beside him, then scurried down in her dressing gown to get the milk and start breakfast before Dudley woke up and started wailing.

            She yawned widely as she reached down and groped for the milk jar that was always carefully placed in the exact same spot – marked out by a small mat with the words, “The cow is nothing but a machine which makes grass fit for us people to eat,” printed on it.  The John McNulty quote had been placed on a small square just perfect for the size of the milk bottle upon a special request order by Petunia.  She had nearly selected, “As for butter versus margarine, I trust cows more than chemists,” by Joan Gussow.  On reflection, however, she had decided that she trusted a successful CEO of a technology company more than a professional woman who made her money telling other people how to raise their children.  This was the level of care that Petunia had given to every single item in her home.  Just so she could reach down for the milk without looking and amuse the milkman at the same time.  She had ensured with meticulous attention that her home was perfect down to the last detail.

            Petunia had brought her other hand to cover her mouth as she finished the yawn as she stood up.  She might have turned around and headed back into the house without seeing the bundle on the doorstep, leaving Vernon to discover him when he went to work, if a very loud meow hadn’t caught her attention and made her look out to where a tabby sat perched on her garden wall.

            “Shoo!” she cried at it, gesturing violently with the milk bottle.  This was unfortunate, as she sloshed a good deal of milk onto her carefully chosen welcome mat (“As for me and my house, we will serve the Lord” from the Bible, despite the fact that the Dursleys were not particularly religious).

            As she looked down in annoyance, after shooting a dirty look at the tabby, Petunia Dursley caused a great deal more milk to splatter all over the mat when she dropped the bottle upon seeing a baby on her doorstep.

            She did not scream in fear, though she was certainly startled and, because she knew the danger this boy was in, afraid.  She did not scream in anger, though that would come.  She screamed in anguish because though she had never seen the boy, she would recognize James Potter’s son anywhere.  And there was only one reason that Lily would permit her boy to be left on Petunia’s doorstep – over her own dead body.

            Petunia fell to the ground after the milk – inordinately lucky not to kneel on any of the broken glass – and covered her face with her hands as if to stop her sobs from pouring out.  She fell to the ground because everyone loved Lily, and, though that might exclude Vernon and – if she had breath in her body – it would exclude Dudley, that did not exclude Petunia.

 

*~*

 

            At least, Petunia had thought that no one would be able to find her in her hidden place.  However, she had not even had the chance to work up a proper cry and feel thoroughly sorry for herself when Petunia was startled to feel arms go around her.  She looked up and, for once, wanted to push Lily away.  It was Lily’s fault.  It was all Lily’s fault.  “Go to mum, you’re the one she wants,” she muttered, burying her face back in her arms, which were also hugging her knees.

            “Her loss, Pet,” Lily whispered with all the wisdom of an eight year old.  “She’s asking for you, over and over again.”

            “She wants her daughter,” Petunia could barely keep herself from wailing.  “I’m not her daughter.”  Now she sounded mostly petulant but she was entitled to it.

            “But you are my sister,” Lily told her, and Petunia finally looked up at her.  She took comfort then, in Lily’s words and Lily’s arms.

            After awhile, Lily pulled her up and dragged her, protesting, along several corridors.  Petunia didn’t keep track of where they were going, so she was surprised when she saw Nurse Robbins.  Nurse Robbins, on the other hand, seemed to have been expecting her.  “Well, if it isn’t the Evans girls arriving at last!” she cried cheerfully.  Most of the hospital staff knew them by now, called them “dears” on good days and “poor dears” behind their backs on bad days.  Lily dear ignored the “poor dears” better than Petunia, but then she received fewer of them.  Or maybe that was Petunia’s imagination.  “We were about to start without you!  You can’t keep the other kids waiting for cake like this, especially when it’s just sitting out there in front of them!”

            “I told them it’s your birthday, Pet,” Lily confessed with an encouraging smile.  “They wanted to throw you one of the birthday parties.”

            “But I’m not a patient,” Petunia protested.  “I’m not in the ward-“

            “You come by to visit all the time,” Nurse Robbins told her firmly.  “You’re always in the hospital.  Most importantly, if you won’t listen to the rest of it, all of the kids and nurses, myself included, want to celebrate with you.  So you’re getting cake, young lady, and don’t even try to fight it.”

            In the oncology department’s children’s ward at St. Stephen’s Hospital, birthday parties called for breaking into the Wig Closet.  Everyone donned a crazy wig, most draping costume jewelry or wildly colorful scarves around them to boot – including the regular nurses and any doctor or surgeon unfortunate enough to stumble in during the party.  There was a cake with six candles and the smiling faces of the kids that Petunia had visited about once a week for two years all around her.  It was a strange family, and a dangerous one to be attached to really, but it was more secure than her real family felt most of the time.

            They sang silly songs, Petunia and Lily danced around the room with Marian and Belle, and Lily did her regularly requested stand-up comedy act of jokes she had collected at school all week to tell here.  They were always twice as funny when Lily retold them, even when she got them wrong.  Petunia knew that Lily was really the one who loved coming here, bringing cheer to the smaller children and being adored by them, but Petunia felt like she belonged in this ward as well.  Lily had brought her here.

            Eventually they brought out the cake and lit the candles.  Petunia did not want to make a wish.  She would never make another birthday wish or ever introduce the idea to Dudley (or Harry for that matter).  Instead, for as many years as adults could insist she pretend to believe in that nonsense, she came back to this ward and disposed of her worthless wish the way she had on that day.  She offered it to one of the kids who still believed in magic or, later, that magic was as simple and open to everyone as she had once been foolish enough to think herself.

            After Lily got her letter, she wondered: would it work for them?  The ones who managed to believe even here?

            When she was six years old, it was much easier to believe in magic and happiness in a silly wig in the children’s oncology ward than it was with her mother.  Lily smiled at her, looking proud that she had been selfless enough to give her wish away.  Petunia whispered slightly to God, hoping that religion could come through at least, that she would never lose Lily too.

 

*~*

 

            Lily’s son blinked awake and looked up at her.  “Mama,” he requested, fully expecting to get exactly what he wanted.  Petunia knew that he was not calling her ‘Mama,’ but she shuddered as if he had.  She felt the chill of another duty of being Lily’s sister settle on her shoulders.  She wanted to scream, No!  She wanted to snap at baby Harry that she could not deliver his “Mama,” and she would not take her place.

            “Lily,” Petunia echoed the cry of longing, but more plaintive and hopeless rather than fully expectant.

            The crinkle of parchment made her draw her hand away from her face, only for a second baring her grief before the beady eyes of neighborhood women peering through curtains at her.  Then she recovered herself.  She snatched the envelope out of her nephew’s hands and slit it open.

            “Albus Dumbledore?” she read aloud in surprise, not recognizing the name.  She had expected something from Sirius Black, or even a letter from Lily, or the loopy handwriting of Marissa Fletcher.  Who but a Marauder would leave a baby they gave a damn about on a doorstep overnight?  More to the point, who was the Albus Dumbledore to be leaving Harry on her doorstep?  Well, that might explain why he thought she would take him in without even properly asking.

            “Dumdore!” Harry echoed, apparently delighted.  Petunia gave him a warning look.  “Dum…dore,” Harry repeated more sheepishly, even uncertainly.  “Mama now?”  Never again, child.  Mama never again.

            Petunia ignored him, not for the last time.  She instead turned back to the letter.  She did not take in much, barely absorbed anything the first time through the letter.  She already knew that Lily was dead and who had killed her.  Beyond that, she knew little and cared less.  Until she read the name Sirius Black.

            “What?” Petunia breathed, utterly flabbergasted.  Petunia stared because of all the horrible freak friends that Lily had ever pranced through Petunia’s perfect little life, Sirius Black was the only one that Petunia had ever liked.  He had granted a dear, dying wish before, and now it seemed that he had carried out the dark, desperate and terrible killing desire that Petunia kept hidden at the bottom of her soul.

 

*~*

 

            Most people, Petunia was to come to find, did not appreciate the normal.  They appreciated the abnormal.  Even though Petunia came to the Children’s Ward every week on at least one of the trips to visit her mother, it was Lily and her friends, who came two or three times a year at best, who were asked after regularly and hungrily desired in their absence.  The children who Petunia knew by name, disease, attending doctor, treatment, favorite color and favorite wig from the Closet wanted her sister, who had abandoned them for greener pastures and offered only jokes barely comprehensible to Muggle children when she came.  They wanted the, Petunia grudgingly admitted, thoroughly charming and boisterous Marissa Fletcher who had spent her first visit organizing a revolt against the nurses (who had, unbelievably, been amused).  They begged for the smirking, mischievous James Potter who played with them as if he really didn’t understand that they could barely get out of their beds and would have livid bruises from the most minor of brushes with accidents.  They talked more freely with Peter Pettigrew than they did with Petunia, cheering the antics of the others.  They flocked around Remus Lupin, who looked thoroughly uncomfortable with the attention but eventually opened up and amused them all with comments inserted at precisely the right moment to complement his friends’ antics.

            Sirius Black, however, had the biggest fan in the form of the smallest and most adorable resident of the ward.  When she was approaching death, it wasn’t Petunia Evans who had hovered at her bedside almost as often as her parents in the past fortnight, that she wanted but the boy she had met only once but still giggled about when she had the energy and sighed over when she didn’t.  Petunia had almost expected to be asked in to say goodbye when she picked up the phone call from the hospital.  Instead it was Annabelle’s parents asking if she could get in touch with her friend Sirius Black for her.

            Lily, once she heard through the hurt and fear in Petunia’s voice, she took a pinch of Floo powder and stuck her head into the dying fire that had burst into emerald green flames.  Petunia nearly screamed aloud.  She had never seen Lily and her father communicating this way, although she knew that he had had their house added to the Floo Network so that he could check in on his daughter occasionally and see her face – whether it was disembodied and in the middle of a fire or not.  “Gryffindor Common Room!” she shouted, then her head was not in the fire any longer.  Her head was _off_ of her head and spinning madly for an endless instant before it disappeared entirely.  Now Petunia really did scream.

            Petunia was beginning to wish that Lily didn’t come home for Easter Break anymore, but then she would have had no idea how to reach Sirius Black in time.

            And once he came, Petunia could not be jealous that he had been asked for or upset at him arriving in a tornado of ashes that he dumped all over their living room.  He was out of breath, explaining to Lily that he had taken a secret passageway out of the Castle and snuck into Hogsmeade or wherever to Floo to her house.  Petunia was mildly impressed.   He seemed to have taken a great deal of trouble, especially for a girl that he had only met three times.

            Mr. Evans drove the three of them to the hospital, both of the wizards in the back looking grim and even slightly frightened.  In the front seat, Petunia felt cold but repressed her shiver of distress.

            Only Sirius Black went in to see Annabelle, dressed in full bio-hazard gear but with his hair still somehow falling with a perfect grace onto his face, while Petunia and Lily hovered at a window into the room where Annabelle lay dying.  Although he had looked nervous and even fearful in the car, he showed none of it in the room itself.  He smiled winningly at her and her adoring smile only encouraged him.  Most of their conversation was too soft for the girls to overhear, but Annabelle smiled and a sparkle that had long since stopped gracing her eyes regularly returned in full force.  She shyly looked him up and down several times and laughed at his jokes, once so hard that she set off a worried whoop of several monitors.

            Petunia, to say nothing of Lily, could not take her eyes from him and the casual charm he wove over the adoring little girl who had developed a crush on him months ago.  When the nurses finally insisted that Sirius leave, he gave her hand the gentlest of squeezes, winked conspiratorially at her and slowly walked out to where Lily and Petunia were waiting.

            The drive back was very quiet, but, peering back occasionally, Petunia saw Lily and Sirius holding hands as if to comfort each other.  When Mr. Evans had gone gratefully to bed, the three teenagers lingered.  “Thank you for coming, Sirius,” Petunia said quietly, then turned to head up the stairs.

            At the top, she glanced down at Lily and Sirius.  Lily was looking at Sirius in a way very similar to Annabelle’s entranced gaze.  She saw Lily move forward and kiss Sirius ever so slightly on the lips.  She did not turn and run off as Petunia might have done if she had ever had the courage to kiss the handsome, sweet, charming boy standing in the room with her sister.  Instead, she boldly took his hand.

            “I’ve got to head back, they don’t know I’ve gone,” was all that Sirius could say.  Lily nodded, withdrawing her hand.  Before she could completely reclaim it, Sirius snatched it back.  “We’ll talk when you get back from Break?”

            A smile spread over Lily’s face, and she nodded.

 

*~*

 

            After she had read the letter three times, Petunia tucked it into her dressing gown pocket almost absently as she stared down at the baby in front of her.  Handling him more gently than she had ever held Dudley, like something in between a feisty one year old and a bomb that would go off at any moment, Petunia picked up the child who was now her responsibility – because she was Lily’s sister and apparently this meant quite a bit in the magical world.

            “There must be some mistake.”

            She stood up and looked out over the street.  She started forward when she saw a disheveled looking man with graying brown hair leaning against her garden wall with the tabby cat from earlier next to his head.  She was on the edge of her porch when he started forward to stop her and said aggressively, “Stop, Petunia Dursley.”  Her face must have betrayed her annoyance and distaste both for his presence and for the job she had been given, for he added in a thoroughly threatening voice, “Or I will not be responsible for what I do to you if you take that baby one step outside of your house.”

            It took a moment, then Petunia recognized him.  “Lupin?  Remus Lupin?” she said, then her face turned angry.  “Then you take him.  I don’t want him here.”  What this would mean for Dudley had suddenly slammed into her like a tone of bricks.  She even started forward, but he leapt forward and stood in front of her, truly menacing for the split second before Petunia backed away against the door.  “I will shout for Vernon!” she hissed, meaning to yell, but all that came out was a squeak barely louder than a whisper.

            “You will not put that baby in danger by removing him from your house,” Remus told her with the air of one who will not be refused.

            “Petunia?” came the cry of Vernon Dursley, who was awkwardly holding the one year old who had started wailing at his mother’s cry as he lumbered down the stairs.

            Petunia’s eyes were as wide as saucers and as frightened as if she had just faced her own personal Boggart.  She looked imploringly at the man in front of her.  “Take him!” she felt herself pleading.

            She even moved forward to attempt to place him in Remus’s arms before he stepped onto the porch and decidedly invaded her personal space to emphasize his threat, “If you try to take that baby outside the protection of your home one more time, I swear by all that I hold dear…”

            “No!  Just until Vernon leaves!  Please!” she said desperately.  Now she succeeded in handing off Harry as if he were a dangerous subway bomb and Remus Lupin the only police officer capable of defusing him.  “I – I need to figure this out…please, I need until tonight before I can –“

            “Very well,” Remus said, holding the squirming Harry gingerly and lovingly.  Petunia turned around and for the briefest of seconds allowed her fright to show on her face.  Then she opened the door to her house and took the screaming baby from her husband.  She heard herself explaining about dropping the milk because a tabby cat brushed the back of her legs and gave her a scare.  She saw only vaguely the dark look on her husband’s face at the mention of the cat.  She cooked breakfast, and, when she had ushered her husband into the kitchen, she brought Remus Lupin in from the front porch and had him stand in the cupboard under the stairs where she would eventually place her nephew permanently.

            Only when Vernon’s car had, with a tremendous backfire of automobile importance, pulled out of the driveway and started down Privet Drive did Remus Lupin step from the hiding place in which Petunia Dursley had placed him.  Petunia did not notice immediately.  She had gone to the stove and bowed herself over it slightly, letting out a few strangled sobs she could not fully suppress.  She heard his footsteps and turned with a mixture of shame and fury at having been caught in this pose, at seeing the proof of her sister’s death and Lily’s last explosion of magic to wreck what would have been a normal, happy life.

            “You should hold your nephew,” Remus told her.  Petunia did not move.

            “You want him,” she said quietly.  “I see it in your eyes, in the way that you hold him.  Why not take him?”

            Anger and something approaching disgust flashed briefly across Remus Lupin’s face.  When it was removed, Petunia knew it was more a matter of his self-control than the disappearance of those emotions.  “I suspect Professor Dumbledore’s letter was clear enough on that point,” was all that he said.

            “If Voldemort is dead, why does he need my protection?” Petunia asked, not moving a muscle but her eyes flicking over to where Dudley was banging his spoon on his highchair and splattering food over her immaculately clean kitchen.

            “Because he had followers, lieutenants, who would do anything to destroy the boy who destroyed him,” Remus said seriously.  Then he stepped forward until he was in front of Petunia, forcing her to face the small child in his arms.  “Because he is your family, Lily’s son.  Because I am not capable of caring for a child.  Because he has no one else now.”

            “Being Lily’s sister ruined my life,” she told him seriously, surprised to find herself speaking her secret pain.  In a flash, she saw Dudley undergoing all of the torments that she had endured: her mother’s acceptance of Hogwarts and excitement about all of Lily’s nonsense and frog spawn when she literally did not know that Petunia existed, her father scheduling her mother’s treatments around when Lily would be home, her mother rejecting Vernon and telling her that that Potter boy was a better catch, her school seeming small and unimportant next to Lily’s, knowing that she couldn’t go away to school too with Lily in Scotland, being nothing to amazing people she secretly admired but Lily’s sister…

            “She loved you,” Remus told her seriously.  He didn’t understand.  No one did.  Why should this man standing there in her kitchen with an unwanted child be the first?  “Harry has never done anything to you.”

            “He will to Dudley,” Petunia told him seriously.  “He will do to Dudley what Lily did to me.  It doesn’t matter if he grows up to be an angel or a monster, all of his life Dudley will be nothing but Harry’s cousin.  He is famous now, yes?  Vernon overheard some of your lot talking about him.”

            “He has been dubbed The Boy Who Lived,” Remus answered.  “None of them will bother you.  Few will be able to, and those will not dare – especially if you request that they leave you alone.”

            “When he gets his precious little letter, he will enter a world where everyone knows his name?” Petunia demanded.  Remus nodded.  “And either Dudley will also receive a letter and join him in this world – to be seen always as Harry’s cousin – or he will not and remain here never to be satisfied with a life he might have loved.  I cannot bear for my son to suffer that.”

            In answer, Remus deposited Harry in Petunia’s arms.  Petunia took him, looking into the eyes that were just like her sister’s, and burst into sobs again.  She hated it, hated that she was crying for the sister who had cost her so much and hated that this man who refused to understand was witnessing it.  She felt cold as she held him, fear clutching at her heart with icy fingers, knowing that she could bring terrible danger on her family for this.  She hated the tears because the moment that they fell on Harry’s head she knew that she would take him.  She was always going to take him.  Dumbledore’s letter alone had been sufficient for that.  If he thought he had to send an old friend to convince her, he knew nothing.

            Dudley was now protesting loudly that he was not being given his mother’s undivided attention.  Already, Harry was costing him love, bits of love and time she would not have for him now with a second child to raise.  Already, he was Harry’s cousin rather than simply her son.  She was being forced to set aside Dudley’s mother and act as Lily’s sister.

            Remus Lupin looked worried, even fearful.  He did not know that she would take him.  So Petunia pulled herself together and, holding Harry carefully but not closely, locked eyes with the werewolf whose eyes were haunted by ghosts Petunia could barely fathom and had no desire to glimpse.  “Is my son magical?”

            “I don’t know,” Remus Lupin told her honestly.  She knew it was honestly because he had seemed surprised and blurted out the answer without thinking.  “It’s entirely possible.”

            “We can’t afford him.”

            “I will send you money for him,” Remus Lupin replied immediately.  “My family fortune will cover his costs.”  And it did, until the Lupin fortune was pulled out from under him, and he could barely afford to send enough to properly feed and clothe Harry.

            “I will not tell him that he is famous,” Petunia continued.  “I will not have a blustering braggart making Dudley feel insignificant.”

            “He will do better to be raised without the truth,” Remus Lupin replied evenly.  He thought that she was grasping at straws to not have to take the boy.  He really had no idea that he had already won, that he never need have come.

            “I will not teach him to be proud of his freakishness,” Petunia said harshly.  “I will not pretend to approve of him.”

            “So long as he lives,” Remus said, though now his eyes flashed with anger and sadness again.  “If you are trying to provoke me into taking him away, know that I will never endanger Lily and James’s child by taking him from your home.”

            Petunia knew of danger.  She knew what danger she was putting her family in if she agreed to take this boy.  It was one thing to be unprotected prey for creatures like the one that had destroyed her mother.  It was quite another to be potentially targeted by them, to be safe only when in the confines of her house, so meticulously arranged and now to be disrupted.  “Lily refused to run from danger.  Now she must bring it into my family, even after it destroyed hers.”

            “It was her family that Lily refused to deny,” Remus told her fiercely.  “It was because she refused to deny you that she painted a target on her forehead.  It was for you that Lily set herself on the path of danger – because she would not pretend that you were not her family.”

            Petunia felt struck, but she determined not to show this to Remus Lupin.  “I will make it easy for Harry to make the opposite choice.”

            “So that Dudley will never love him as you love Lily?” Petunia was almost breathless with the weight of his understanding.

            “So that he can never destroy Dudley the way Lily has destroyed me,” Petunia answered seriously.  “And you will not visit.”

            “I will never speak to you in this house again,” Remus promised her, “if that is what you need to take him.”

            Petunia broke the gaze and backed away, still holding Harry.  She walked across the kitchen and sat down in a chair so that she was almost eye-level with Dudley in his high chair.  He was crying for attention, but when he saw the new child in his mother’s arms he stopped and looked curiously at Harry, reaching out a stubby finger to try to poke him.  Petunia looked at her son, looked into his squinty little eyes.

 

_In your eyes, I wanted to see my own.  I wanted to be able to look at you and know that you would have everything that I lacked.  I wanted to see proof that you were not like Lily and that you would not suffer the fate of either Evans girl, but of course your eyes could tell me nothing of the sort.  That was yet to be determined, and I made the decision that would save you from my fears._

 

            “Tell your professor that I will take Harry on one condition,” Petunia told Remus Lupin, still regarding her son and sounding stronger than she thought she could manage.  “He will never send Dudley an invitation to Hogwarts.  My son will never go to that place and your dark world.”

            “You would deny your son his rightful place-“

            “In a world of death and destruction where he would never be permitted to be anything but Harry Potter’s less interesting cousin,” Petunia replied.  “Yes.  It is the only way that I know to save him from my fate.  Nor will I permit him to love Harry.  Not when he will lose him.”

            Remus Lupin regarded her for a long moment.  “Your love of Lily does not make you ugly or weak.  It is the best part of you.”

            “Yes, it is only as Lily’s sister that you see any good in me,” Petunia told him angrily.  “Tell your Dumbledore that unless I have his promise I will deposit his precious little boy savior on the doorstep of an orphanage.  I love my sister, yes, but I love my son.  He is what I will not sacrifice on the altar of sisterhood.  I will not deny Dudley the chance to shine in his own glory rather than reflect Harry’s.”

            Remus Lupin just looked at her for a very long time.  Petunia met his gaze stubbornly, knowing that she was right despite the shivers his look of mingled anger, disgust and frustration sent tingling up and down her back.  When he finally spoke, Petunia wished that he had not.  The depth of his suffering was apparent in his voice, and she knew that it was a kind of pain she could not even fathom.  “There are worse things than reflected glory.”  Then he turned and walked out of her formerly immaculate kitchen.

            At the door, he stopped and said almost as if it was his spiteful retort to all the horrible things she had said about Lily Evans and Harry Potter, “If you want to keep your son in the dark, I would be careful of his emotional moments.  I know Lily knew how to harness her magic early, but most have explosions of involuntary magic when particularly angry or frightened.”  Then he had left her in her meticulously arranged house and cold world, holding a baby and barely able to hear the cries of the one she truly loved.

            She felt morbid, but she could only laugh as she thought of what Remus Lupin thought of her.

 

_In your eyes, I am normal._

 

            So Petunia Dursley started her new life with a shiver that she told herself was only a draft despite the fact that she had done nearly everything in her power to eliminate that possibility.  The tears felt like ice cubes frozen to her face, and the tiny furnace of heat that was Harry Potter burned her so terribly that it was all that she could do not to drop him with a cry of dismay.

            Thus it began: the Dursleys and Harry Potter under one roof.  Thus it began: Petunia distancing herself from Harry in front of her husband and son so they would never connect with him themselves.  Thus it began: Petunia hiding her love for her second son.  Thus it began: the spoiling of Dudley so he would never manifest freakishness in anger or fear.  Thus it began: the childhood of Harry Potter, the definition that would take over the Dursleys’ home life.

            Thus it began: Petunia’s desperate mission to save her son from her life.

            And so, instead of spending her life spinning excuses, Petunia spun clever lies so that her son would never have to put his imagination to the pathetic use Petunia had.  She did her job so well Dudley never developed any imagination at all.  Instead of tending to making her son strong and healthy, Petunia gave in to his every whim for fear of the evidence a tantrum or fear could cause, proof that he could have been just as magical as Harry if Petunia could have born the thought of her precious boy being “Harry’s cousin” his entire life.  She did her job so well that Dudley, at fourteen, was wider than he was tall and spoiled beyond all reason.  She spent her life distancing him from Harry, instilling in him her desire for blessed normal.  She did her job so well that Dudley hated and feared magic, but he took the conventional meaning of “normal” and left himself without ambition or dream.  Petunia spent her life making Dudley the special one, the loved one, the known one.  She did her job so well that Dudley at fifteen had no concern for anyone but himself – not even her.

            Had Petunia known, at the time, she probably would have thought that it was worth it for Dudley to not be “Harry Potter’s cousin.”  Anything was better than that fate.  It wasn’t until Albus Dumbledore declared his judgment on Dudley, his harsh verdict, that she realized that the bargain she had made had not come cheap, and she might have been the one who came off the worst in the deal.

            That was why, on the night when Petunia Dursley finally left Harry Potter behind for good in the house he had injected with icy air during the hottest summer night, she was so happy to see that all her plans had gone awry when he saved Dudley from a Dementor.  She was more relieved than she would have thought she could possibly be, sixteen years ago, that she had not made Harry nothing to Dudley.  Dudley did love Harry, to some small degree, and he was not the monster she could have made him after all.  She was glad, in the end, that the last terrible thing she had had to do for Lily – twisting her life into a lie and mockery – had failed.  Thus it ended, Petunia’s duty to Lily and the charm protecting Lily’s son at the expense of Lily’s sister.

            Petunia stepped out into the night and felt warmth flood through her entire body.


	11. Sirius: The Reason I Underestimated You

**A/N:** My thanks to AnotherDreamer for allowing me to use the classic Sirius phrase she originally coined in Prelude to Destiny: “Do hippos secretly want to dance with sugarplum fairies?”  Also, thanks to my beta.

**Chapter Ten**

**The Reason I Underestimated You**

_In your eyes, I am a pawn._

            That was the main qualification to become one of the people that Sirius Black regarded with contempt.  Obviously, they had never met him.  He was clearly a Queen.  No, he wasn’t gay whatever some people who should _mind their own business_ had commented on his and James’s relationship.  He meant the most powerful and useful chess piece on the board – the one that could go anywhere and do anything – move in any direction and as many spaces as she cared to move.  He wasn’t a King, the piece to be protected and preserved, whose capture would mean the end of the game.  He was simply the most powerful protector of that King.

            He was right.  He was no pawn.  He was the most powerful piece on the board, slamming down on the opposition like a hammer.  What Sirius Black did not realize was that he was still a chess piece.  That meant that he was not the one playing the game.  He was not the one calling the shots.  That was why he had made so many terrible mistakes, why he had underestimated so many in his life.  He did not realize that he may not have been a pawn, but he was still a chess piece in someone else’s game.

            It should be clarified that Sirius Black lived only the first twenty-one years of his life in this state of ignorance about what it meant to be a chess piece on someone else’s board.  As fate would have it, he was destined to have a very long time in the rest of his life to ponder his mistakes and the misery that they caused.  They all came to him one night in a brilliant flash and had poured relentlessly on top of his head ever since.

            Sirius Black took grim stock of all of those that he had underestimated and the moment that he should have realized what they had done:

 

**1\. The Noble and Most Ancient House of Black**

 

            _Toujours Pur_.  It really had no meaning for him and certainly not in the way it meant everything to all of the other members of his family.  Not when he was young.  How could it?  He grew up in an insular world where he was permitted contact with no one who was not “always pure.”  If Sirius had ever thought about it, he would have been hard pressed to think that there were wizards and witches in the world that were not on the Black Family tapestry.  The only ones that he had a hint of growing up were those who had been blasted off.

            The awareness crept on slowly.  There were other houses on the street that simply could not be just for decoration.  Sometimes, looking out of the windows, Sirius would see people whose existence was not recognized by the Noble and Most Ancient House of Black.  He watched them spilling out into the street and driving in mechanical creations he rather liked the look of, to tell the truth.  When he asked about them, Walburga Black, nee Black, gave him the tanning of his life.

            That was when it happened.  His mother had not, as she had hoped, discouraged him from pursuing the coarse and horrifying reality of Muggle cars.  She had turned them into forbidden fruit, and Sirius Black seemed to know instinctively that that was the most devastatingly delicious delicacy of all.  So Sirius Black glued himself to the window that overlooked the street every morning when the other fathers along the street set off for work in their cars.  They looked so much happier than his own father did stepping into the glowing green fireplace or bringing his wand up in a salute to his mother before Disapparating.

            Eventually, his curiosity could not be sated by mere glances.  He had to go investigate them, see them up close.  Perhaps even, he could barely contain his excitement when he thought it, talk to some of the men who stood with the cars innards exposed and tinkered with them.

            He learned from his clandestine observations through the window and, on rare occasions when he could slip out of the house, surreptitiously peering up closer as the cars drove off, that not all automobiles were created equal.  There were clunky, rusty, bulky Ford Anglias that protested every step of the way like the Pattersons’ two houses to the right, and there were sleek, smooth, aerodynamic machines that shot effortlessly forward at the slightest touch like the Mehaffys’ Porsche at the end of the street, and there were twenty cars in between on just that street.  There were also oddly shaped Volkswagens that looked cool but did not run with the sleek speed of the Porsche.  There was even the truly decrepit “bucket of bolts” directly across the street that provided the bulk of Sirius’s knowledge due to its frequent need for home repairs by Mr. Turner.

            Then one day, when he was ten years old, it happened.  Sirius Black saw the most perfect thing he had ever laid eyes on.  It was in an entirely different league than the giant wheeled boxes that lumbered down the street every day, and even the Mehaffys’ Porsche now fit into that category.  It had two wheels, a long, sleek seat, shiny metal handlebars and a _vroom_ of elegance and importance.  It was Sirius Black’s first motorcycle.  It was an automobile with the power, steering, and romance of a broomstick.  It was flying on the ground.  It was perfection.

            And it slid to an effortless but dramatic stop _right across the street_.  With no caution for whether he would be missed, no caution for family members that might see him dash into the street, none of the usual care he took on recon missions at all, Sirius bolted out of the Noble and Most Ancient House of Black and sprinted across the street.  The young man who had dismounted was nearly as cool as his vehicle – if such a thing were possible for even the owner of such a magnificent object.  He had pulled off his helmet and shaken his long black hair in what Sirius had no way of knowing was a fair to above average impersonation of James Dean.

            The teenager who had just become Sirius’s textbook definition of the absolute height of _cool_ turned to look at him in mild surprise but extreme pleasure at seeing so ardent and obvious an admirer.  “What’s your name, kid?” he asked with a casual nonchalance that Sirius would perfect during his own teenage years.

            “Sirius,” he said breathlessly, staring at the machine that defied all language to provide a suitable description.

            “Don’t take it too far, kid,” the teenager laughed.  “You like the bike?”

            “Bike?” Sirius said the word reverentially.

            “The motorcycle, Sirius,” the teenager said with another laugh.  “Would you like to touch it?”

            Did hippos secretly want to dance with sugarplum fairies?

            Should purebloods dominate Muggles?

            Was Kreacher a slimy git?

            “ _Hell_ yeah,” Sirius whispered.  The teenager gave a roaring laugh and slapped him on the back.  That did not mean nearly as much, however, as the teenage boy allowing him to reach out his hand and reverently stroke the seat of the motorcycle.  He barely dared brush his fingers along it, slowly moving them up towards the handlebars.  It was like a holy rite.

            The tips of his fingers were on the verge of touching the ignition when, with a ferocious bang that belied the decrepit-looking old woman’s appearance, Walburga Black, nee Black, burst out of her house and let out a shrill shriek for her son.  “ _Sirius Black, get back here now!_ ”

            The son in question jumped what felt like and might very well have been ten feet in the air and scampered immediately toward his mother – however much of a wrench it was to leave the precious motorcycle behind him.  Though Sirius did not see it, the look that his mother fixed on the James Dean impersonator made him practically whimper and nearly choke with relief when his date finally bounded out of the house a moment later.  The one with which she regarded her son once he had been ushered back into the house would have sent the “rebel without a cause” screaming into the night on foot.

            Sirius fully expected to be given another severe beating.  Regulus, perched excitedly on the stairs where he could peer into the foyer, obviously eagerly anticipated this as well.  Instead Walburga Black, nee Black, merely fixed Sirius with her glare and told him, “You have not been a good son.  You will rectify this behavior.  Do not associate with the Muggles again.”

            Perhaps she had recognized her mistake with the beating.  Perhaps she expected her lifelong lessons of duty and discipline to make this the worst possible punishment for her son and heir.  But just like her beating about the cars, her frightening reprimand had the exact opposite effect that she had intended.  A sudden understanding burst upon Sirius in that moment.  He didn’t _have_ to be a good son.  It was _possible_ to be a bad son, to disappoint his parents.  It was an option to disrupt the cotillions they forced on him; it was an option to humiliate them at dinner parties with the “best people”; he was capable of not acting perfectly at family reunions.  He had the choice.

            Sirius understood that his mother thought that he was a pawn – a pawn to be fashioned and groomed to carry on the Noble and Most Ancient House of Black.  She had meant to assert the expectations that she had for her pawn. Instead she had only brought it to his awareness that he was considered, but did not have to be, her pawn.

            She had also taught him the definition of the word “Muggle” and very foolishly assigned it to the person that he thought of as the height, the very summit, of _cool_.  He could never see the family’s politics quite the same way again.

            The next day was Saturday.  Sirius Black bounded out of bed at five o’clock in the morning.  That was before Regulus would wake up and long before his parents would bother with him of their own accord.  It was time he used to watch Mr. Turner’s weekly battle with his junky automobile.  Sirius, taking considerably more care than he had last night or, indeed, any other trip outside of the Noble and Most Ancient House of Black, slipped silently into the street and walked carefully up to Mr. Turner where he had his head buried in the guts of his “bucket of bolts.”

            “Excuse me, sir,” Sirius said quietly.  Mr. Turner jumped but came just short of banging his head.  He looked up in surprise and regarded the young boy standing before him with utter shock.

            “Can I ‘elp ya?” he asked, adjusting his wire-rimmed glasses and wiping his hands on a rag he afterwards tucked into the back pocket of his work jeans.

            It was Sirius’s first experience with less than perfect grammar and enunciation.  He had the urge to correct it, but then he wondered if it was simply a dialect.  He had heard that there were different dialects of many foreign languages if not all of them.  It had not occurred to him that there were different dialects of English, but it made perfect sense.  He hoped he was remembering correctly that people who spoke different dialects could usually converse with each other.  “I was…I was merely wondering…your car…our family does not possess one and…how does it work?”

            An adult had never looked at him so kindly when he was asking one of his “pesky questions” before.  Mr. Turner smiled down at him.  “I wish m’son had yer interest,” he grunted, nodding back toward his house.  “But then, he’s older and ‘too cool’ fer sich things.  How old’re ya, son?  Yer look a trifle old t’be just learnin’ the basics!”

            “My parents do not find intimate knowledge of the inner workings of automobiles a high priority in my education,” Sirius told him.

            Mr. Turner stared as if Sirius had just sprouted a second head.  “’Neath ‘em?”

            “I do not comprehend, sir,” Sirius replied, helplessly.

            “Well, son, this ‘ere is the engine,” Mr. Turner said.  He then launched into a fairly extensive, immensely informative and detailed explanation of the different parts of the car and the maintenance he had recently done on just about each and every one.  The examination of the current problem was even more fruitful as Mr. Turner took him through step by step and even let him assist with the process.  Whenever Sirius asked a question, Mr. Turner still gave him that odd look, but eventually he answered Sirius’s refined accent and strange questions without comment or surprise.

            Things were truly smashing this fine Saturday morning right up until the moment that Orion Black threw open the door with a crack only slightly less violent than his wife’s the night before and simply stood menacingly looking at his son and Mr. Turner without expression or movement.  Mr. Turner looked up and regarded him for a moment.  He gave a guarded wave, but Orion Black did not respond.

            “Strange bloke,” Mr. Turner muttered.  “Ya be sure to keep on the good side o’ that there family, boy.  Did yer family jus’ move inter Grimmauld Place?”

            “No, we have been here for five generations,” Sirius replied, his mouth dropping open slightly.

            Mr. Turner stopped fiddling with the fan belt immediately and slowly turned to regard the boy he had been conversing with happily only a moment ago.  He stared at Sirius in open-mouthed horror.  “By Gad!  Yer one of ‘em!”  Where before there had been pride mixed with consternation, now there was fear.  Mr. Turner actually _backed away from him_.  “Ya best be movin’ ‘long, sonny!” he cried in an unnaturally high and strained voice.  “Go home, now!”

            As Mr. Turner practically fled into the house, Sirius turned to look at his father.  He was not looking at him, but gazing up the street.  It was not his glare that had frightened off Mr. Turner.  It was just Sirius.

            So for the second time in two days, Sirius understood at last a fundamental truth.  He was made and fashioned to be a pawn to carry on the great tradition of the Noble and Most Ancient House of Black.  They had power and grandeur that he had inherited and must now bear.  Since his mother’s reprimand he was free to hate them, to undermine what they demanded of him at every turn, disagree with them and challenge them, but it did not change the fact that he was their son and heir.  He belonged body and soul to the Ancient and Most Noble House of Black.  His family controlled him and defined him.  Their power was far greater than his own rebelliousness.  He could post as many still photographs of motorcycles in his room as he wanted.  He was a Black, the future and heir to all that they were.

 

**2\. Andromeda Black Tonks**

 

            With his complete and utter awareness of his place in the Black Family, it came as no inconsiderable shock when his favorite cousin defied her mother.  Sirius had really thought that Andy understood.  After all, after the first tea party that Sirius realized he could turn into a debacle, she had winked at him and laughed about it later, but she had still drunk her bloody tea with her betrothed.  She had leaked him the information on Bellatrix that allowed him to turn the summer Family Reunion into utter chaos, but she had bowed her head at her father Alphard’s reprimand.  They had sat together disparaging nearly every family member in turn, but she had shown up to every single function and made polite conversation with them.  She argued passionately against their anti-Muggle and Mudblood policies and denounced the Dark Lord’s movement, but she attended all the parties required of her, including those hosted by those very Death Eaters and kept her mouth shut at a look from her mother.  She may have seen Ted Tonks the Mudblood regularly, but she never attempted to bring him to any of the family events.

            She understood them even better than Sirius did.  Hadn’t she told him after his first sabotaged tea party: “Of course it was brilliant, Sirius!  I’m just saying that you need to think…properly.  You don’t put frogspawn in Aunt Charis’s tea, you use rosemary.  She’s allergic and won’t admit it.  However, my mother, the hostess, is aware and Aunt Charis knows it.  Imagine watching her punish her cousin for what she sees as an attempt to poison her but will not admit was done with rosemary, to which she will not admit an allergy.  Hours of subtle entertainment watching the feud escalate and untraceable to you because pinning down a culprit would require both women to admit what they pretend doesn’t exist.

            “I see,” Sirius had said with a truly wicked grin.  “You’re an evil genius, Andy, aren’t you?”

            “I just appreciate the subtle distinction in mischief that is the difference between enjoying a bottle of merlot by the fire all night versus chugging a car bomb,” she had replied with a warm, mischievous smile.

            “What exactly is in a car bomb?”

            “When you don’t have to ask, and only then, will I consider giving you one,” Andromeda had told him with a laugh.  “It’s not the kind of thing that you’ll hear about from the Blacks, however.”  

            She understood them, absolutely.  She knew their ins and outs and how to play them against each other.

            He had thought that she understood that she was owned.  He had thought that she appreciated the distinction between causing them discomfort and leaving them behind.  She could hate them, cause them no end of trouble, sow mischief into their perfect bigoted existence, but she belonged to the Noble and Most Ancient House of Black.  He had thought that she must surely know that she couldn’t _leave_.  That she couldn’t just run off and marry her Mudblood boyfriend.

            But Andromeda’s name became a small scorch mark on the great tapestry that hung in Sirius’s home.  Sirius spent two hours staring at it the day that his mother blasted the small hole.  He had never really thought about those members who had been blasted off of the tree.  So one could break free.  If one had the courage to break everything that they were.  So the laughing but ultimately obedient Andromeda had that strength after all.

            “Bloody hell, Andy,” Sirius finally whispered after two hours of gazing at the mark in near incomprehension.

            Then his mother, passing in the hall and hearing his comment, made perhaps the biggest mistake of her life.  She poked her head into the room, saw what he was staring at, and told her son, “If you continue down her path, you see what will happen to you.”

            She was lucky that Sirius’s excursion with Mr. Turner quelled Sirius’s spirit.  Sirius believed, he knew, that though he had underestimated Andromeda, he also knew that she had underestimated the Blacks.  She simply had not been able to come back by the time that she learned the truth that Sirius had learned on that fateful Saturday morning.

            It wasn’t until seven years later that Sirius learned allthat Andromeda had accomplished by leaving with her Mudblood.  She changed Uncle Alphard’s mind.  For all his fury and threats before she left, he had missed her.  He had mellowed toward all Mudbloods, and eventually he acted in subtle ways to protect her and her children’s status and even her husband’s.  He left Sirius money in his will and asked that, though he couldn’t give it to his disowned daughter, Sirius pass it on to Andromeda.  She made love overcome honor in the Noble and Most Ancient House of Black.

 

**3\. James Potter, Gryffindor Wonder Boy Extraordinaire**

 

            James Potter was one of the few purebloods in the country that Sirius Black had not met as of September 1st, 1970.  It was very clear why.  James Potter’s hair stuck out at infuriating angles, his clothes were loud, flamboyant and fell on him haphazardly, he ran rather than walked, yelled rather than spoke, and tried to shrug off his parents’ hugs, pets, and hair ruffling farewells with a not-entirely-well-hidden look of regret.  He was like the Muggle kids piling happily into their parents’ cars on their way to a picnic on Saturday.  Sirius, who had watched those Muggle kids with growing longing and dismay since his realization, thought he was brilliant.

            Sirius did not say that to his parents, naturally, but he did sit with James Potter on the train.  “Hello, Sirius Black,” Sirius had introduced himself when he had stored his trunk and taken his seat with dignity.  He considered reaching out his hand for a formal shake but ultimately decided against it.

            He was rather glad a moment later that he had refrained when the boy responded cheekily, “Actually, I’m James Potter.”  Sirius blinked at him.  Then he grinned.  So there really were witches and wizards more like the Turners than the Blacks.  He had the distinct feeling that he was going to enjoy Hogwarts.

            They hit it off pretty well from there.  They were far from becoming blood brothers or anything like that, but they had talked about Quidditch and James had determined that Sirius needed to insert some serious contractions into his vocabulary.  The idea struck Sirius as ridiculous but interesting.

            The real moment of truth came almost an hour after the train set off.  “Slytherin?” James Potter repeated the words of the greasy boy in utter shambles who had taken up barely welcome residence in their compartment.  “Who wants to be in Slytherin?  I think I’d leave, wouldn’t you?” With that, James turned to Sirius, who was rather startled and upset that their association was to diverge so soon.

            “My whole family have been in Slytherin,” Sirius told him, wondering if this boy would understand from his comment that it was more likely that his family would forcibly remove him if he wasn’t placed in Slytherin.  For Sirius Black, the Sorting was more of a formal labeling of his already determined place.  The house elves were probably carving his name into a four poster in the dungeons as they spoke.  The thought did not thoroughly depress him.  Slytherins were known for taking rules into their own hands and, while it might be annoying to weather the ambitious twats, fellow cunning troublemakers – not to mention pre-formed connections to half the house and the Head of House Slughorn – could make for a very good seven years.

            “Blimey, and I thought you seemed all right!” James Potter said.  Now that depressed Sirius, even more somehow than Mr. Turner backing away when he learned his surname.  Being Sorted into Slytherin would solidify the fact that his family owned him, body and soul; it would make all of his small rebellions just part of the personality of his house, his family, and his life.  It would make him their pawn no matter what he did.

            That was why he was still as nervous as any other first year who had no clue where he would end up.  “Maybe I’ll break the tradition,” Sirius said, trying out perhaps the third contraction of his life.  “Where are you headed, if you’ve got the choice?”  Of course, it was ridiculous to think that he would break any sort of Family tradition.  That just did not happen.  He had tried with the motorcycle and the cars and that had worked out just swimmingly.

            James Potter, apparently unaware of his dour inner monologue, brandished an imaginary sword as he declared, “‘Gryffindor, where dwell the brave at heart!’ Like my dad.”  So perhaps he did understand.  Family determined everything.

            That Snape kid made a sound between a grunt and a snort.  Sirius found it rather rude.  James appeared to think so as well.  “Got a problem with that?” he demanded.

            “No,” the boy sneered.  “If you’d rather be brawny than brainy – “

            That was when Sirius Black picked sides – for life, though he didn’t know it.  “Where’re you hoping to go, seeing as you’re neither?” he said.  He wondered briefly if he’d sounded as odd to others as he had to himself when he used the contractions.  Snape left in a huff a moment later, and James Potter smirked at him.

            “Git,” he said.  Sirius nodded and grinned.  That was the magic of James Potter.  That was all it took to inspire loyalty, to feel comfortable around him.  That was all that it took for Sirius to spend the rest of the train ride pretending that he and James would be best friends even after he was Sorted into Slytherin and the boat ride up to the Castle wishing that he could fuck Family tradition and join the ‘brave at heart.’

            But it didn’t matter.  He had seen the power of the name of Black, and the Sorting Ceremony would recognize it over the budding friendship with a boy very different than any other he had ever met.

            As Hogwarts Castle swam into view for the first time, Sirius made a decision.  If he wanted to keep James Potter as a friend, he would have to make a big bonding experience.  Right now.  And hey, the fact that it might get the slimy git from the train in trouble too was just a bonus.  Sirius did feel vaguely bad for the pretty redhead who had also found her way into their boat, but desperate times and all that.

            Thus, with slowed rowing, a quick distraction, and a little circling and misdirection to keep the other two from stopping them from losing the group, the first great caper of the great James Potter and Sirius Black was born.

            Half an hour later, dripping wet and with considerably more than a nodding acquaintance with the Giant Squid, they were fished out of the Lake by a very nervous Hagrid and escorted to the Great Hall for their late introduction to Hogwarts.  Despite the fact that James and Sirius entered with glory and lifelong friendship trailing after them, Sirius knew that it was all about to end.  The power of this moment and this rapidly developing friendship was no match for his heritage – for his very identity.

            He couldn’t be James Potter’s partner in crime.  “Black, Sirius!”  And James was about to find out why.  He was a Black first, then Sirius.

            Sirius sat down gravely on the stool and felt the old hat slide over his head.  Weren’t people a thousand years ago supposed to be smaller rather than larger like this hat seemed to suggest?  Maybe Gryffindor wasn’t _all_ brawn.

            So Sirius sat and grimly awaited his fate.

            It lasted little more than a second.  He barely had time to hear a strange voice chirp, _You had only to ask!_

            Then he heard a ringing voice shout, “GRYFFINDOR!”

            The stern looking woman who had placed the hat on his head while giving him a decidedly stern look for his antics, removed the hat.  If she hadn’t, Sirius might have sat there forever.  He stayed still for a stunned moment in total and complete utter shock.  A great deal of it was rippling through the hall, especially at the Slytherin table.

            Sirius Black looked over at James Potter who threw him an enormous smile and stuck his two thumbs up into the air.  Nervously, Sirius grinned and walked away from the table he had been studying and toward the one that broke into startled but enthusiastic applause.

            _Bloody hell_ , he nearly said allowed as he sat down. James Potter had just cut his shackles.

 

**4\. Remus Lupin, The Friendly Werewolf**

 

            Truth be told, Sirius Black was too flabbergasted and elated to care that another pair of first years had caused more mischief than they did on their first night at Hogwarts.  However, James Potter had not taken it lying down.  So James and Sirius spent their first night in their dormitory rigging a bucket of water to cascade down on Marissa Fletcher and Lily Evans when they came down for breakfast on their first day.  The pair spent their first morning waiting eagerly by the rope to pull the simple Muggle trap that James had apparently seen in cartoons growing up.  Sirius had never heard of Muggle cartoons, but he rather liked the sound of them.

            The girls had certainly shrieked loud enough and run upstairs to change while flinging angry insults at them, but James and Sirius had not had the last laugh that morning.  Exchanging high fives and words of congratulations, they had gone laughing out of the portrait hole, and been greeted with a bucket of mud and slime cascading down on top of them.

            When they looked around, they saw their new dormmate Remus Lupin holding the rope and, when they turned back toward the tower, an resounding chorus of laughter from Lily and Marissa who had come out to watch their planned retaliation after pretending to run upstairs to change.  “You were spying on us, Lupin?” James had demanded in rage.

            “You weren’t subtle,” Remus had returned, smirking at them, then slapping hands with both of the girls.  Still laughing, Lily and Marissa pulled dry robes out of their bags, rung out their hair, and all three skipped quickly down to the Great Hall cackling in victory.  It was a good thing, because the two boys had only to exchange looks to know that this meant war.

            Sirius Black had thought Remus Lupin rather foolish to take sides against his dormmates, whether or not he had met the girls first.  However, the two and a half months of the Prank War covered the first three full moon absences very well.  James and Sirius (and Peter by that point) noticed, of course, but assumed (even when the girls denied it) that they had been cooking up some new strike all night.  However, in the long run it probably wasn’t an ideal strategy because it did make them acutely aware of his absence.

            After the truce was called, Remus Lupin fell violently ill and spent a night in the hospital wing twice, left to visit sick relatives four times, and was called away for two funerals before James figured it out.  When they all told him, Remus Lupin was on the verge of full-scale panic.

            “Please, you can’t tell – please don’t –“ Remus was practically choking out, shooting panicked looks from one boy to the next, shaking his head wildly and nearly hyperventilating.  “I know I’m – but please, Dumbledore knows!  Please don’t tell…”

            “Relax, Remus, it’s cool!” James had finally managed to break into his desperate rambling.  The werewolf had just stared at him in utter shock.

            Sirius had blinked furiously at that thought.   He wasn’t “the werewolf”!  He was Remus!  Sirius felt as if he had been resisting everything in his life up until the moment of his Sorting.  Ever since he had found out about Remus, the struggle had exploded into a full-fledged desperate battle.  Remus was cool – funny, witty, tricky, with some definite backbone…but was the fact that he was a werewolf really _cool_ , James?  Or was it just, well, forgivable because it was Remus?  That would have been easier to swallow.

            Marissa’s reaction, years later, had put Sirius’s to shame.  She just curled up against him like it was nothing, seeing his pain as the only horror in the situation.  But then, Marissa and Remus were undeniably each other’s blind spots.  

            _Oh, you mean my friend of six years is a monster who almost killed my boyfriend because he lost his mind and transformed into a werewolf and never told me any of this before?_ “Please tell me you aren’t carrying this load alone.”

            _Oh, you mean my wife wants to visit Narcissa Malfoy, whose husband nearly raped her and we know for a fact is a Death Eater, every Sunday for no obvious reason despite the fact that she’s not strong enough to resist if they attack her?_   “Take the car, won’t you?  The Floo is too wild for your stomach at the moment.”

            Sirius Black had always known that Remus Lupin would do absolutely anything for Marissa Fletcher.  Even before she reacted that way to his secret, he would have walked through fire (without a Flame-Freezing Charm) for her.  He would have cast himself into a Pit of Everlasting Torment if he could have saved her from her Muggle illness.

            He would have…

            Would he?

            If _she_ asked him…

            The girl who had always been able to sweep aside all of his issues as if they weren’t even there; who had yanked his head down to kiss her after a solid year of him reaching out to grab her hand then pretending it was only to help her up the stairs; who had asked him to watch over her younger brother while she started at the Healer Academy and started him on the path to becoming a private tutor, pulling him out of his depression about not being able to find a job; who had, after Remus received a solid month of fruitless coaching from every other member of the Gryffindor Six on how to propose, simply pulled the ring out of his pocket and shaken her head at him; who had dragged him to every dinner that Lily bravely invited them to despite the growing suspicion.  The girl, who had chosen him from the very first moment…

            The angel whom he worshipped…if she had asked him…

            They had said it time and again: Remus Lupin would do anything that Marissa Fletcher asked of him.  Sirius had just never thought she would ask…

            Sirius Black did not know how it was possible that he had not known that Marissa had died until two days later.  It seemed like the kind of unbelievable thing that could never actually happen in real life.  In later years, he realized that Peter had known it might blow his cover.

            Sirius Black actually saw Remus Lupin on that fateful Halloween Night, practically drowning in a bottle of Firewhiskey in the Three Broomsticks, on his way up to deliver the Potters’ package to Dumbledore.  He saw the devastated look on his old friend’s face, the broken despair that made his every muscle sag.  Sirius Black did not go inside.

            If only he had, Sirius Black might have realized how terribly he had underestimated Remus Lupin that precious hour earlier that would have given him time to warn Lily and James of their impending doom.  Or, at least, that was what he told himself in later years.  If he had known about Marissa, he would have suspected Peter and been able to stop everything in time.  That was one of the thoughts that the Dementors left him, whether or not it was true.  But Sirius Black underestimated Remus Lupin that night, thinking that, at best, he was beginning to regret the side that he had chosen.

            A moment had flashed into Sirius’s head at that moment: the first time that the trio had transformed into animals just before moonrise.  The look on the face of the last human left in the room had been full of fear for his friends and the most profound gratitude that Sirius had ever seen on another person’s face.  There had been a time when easing Remus’s pain had been the most important thing in the world to him.

            As he turned to leave, another old memory flashed into Sirius’s mind: _“Tell me who I hurt Sirius!” “Remus-“ “I know something happened – who did I hurt?”  “Remus-“ “There was someone down there, Sirius!  I know someone almost made it down to the Shack!  Merlin – did the girls follow us?  DID I HURT THEM?”  “Remus – it wasn’t your fault! It was mine!”_

            There would come a time, not far in the future from that moment that Sirius stood outside The Three Broomsticks watching Remus drowning in liquor, when Sirius would once again give almost anything for Remus Lupin’s forgiveness.

            But on that fateful night, Sirius Black walked away from an old friend without a second thought.

 

**5\. Lily, the Insecure Drama Queen**

 

            Lily Evans was amazing.  He had always known that.  Sirius hadn’t really gone beyond that, or thought of anything outside of friendship, until she kissed him.  That night in the Muggle hospital, he had been positively terrified – more scared of a small dying seven year old girl than he was of Filch or even his mother – and not quite ready to deal with more.  When he was, he rather liked the idea of dating Lily Evans.

            When he got back to Hogwarts that night, after walking in a daze of having-just-been-kissed-by-the-indomitable-Lily-Evans through the village and up through secret passageways back to Gryffindor Tower, Sirius Black flopped down into an armchair in shock.  “Geez, what happened, Padfoot?” James Potter had remarked, obviously worried that his daze was due to having watched a seven-year-old die in front of him or something similarly horrible.  “Sorry, do you not want to talk about it?”

            “Lily kissed me,” Sirius said, looking up at his best friend in shock.

            Sirius wouldn’t recognize the way that his best friend’s face locked through his daze, but he would remember it in the month to come, in which James unintentionally gave him a hundred similar clues that Sirius and Lily’s relationship pained him.  It wasn’t that James was a jealous fiend or a bad friend.  He had, in fact, thrown himself into helping Sirius plan dates and helped him think of all the thoughtful surprises that made Lily so giggly and girly – a distinctly odd, though endearing, mood for the intimidating, put-together Lily Evans.

            But James was in a positively rotten mood the entire month.  He was pulling away from Sirius, and he didn’t know why.  Sirius didn’t know what to do.  He had never told James what he meant to him.  He had never explained that it was James who kept him from slipping back into his old way of life, the way of life he had always hated but never been able to escape for even a moment before James.

            So when James let slip enough for Sirius to realize why James’s eyes glazed over out of self-defense whenever he mentioned something about Lily (which was quite often as she was a right pistol and they had had a lot of hilarious moments), Sirius knew what he had to do.  Weighing James and Lily…well, he and Lily could still be friends.  It’s not like they had long-term potential.  He could annoy his mother by dating a Muggleborn, but he had no serious thoughts of pulling an Andromeda.  He knew better than that.

            And Lily and James…it had a very nice ring to it.  And wasn’t James the one who had come up with all of the little gestures that Lily loved so much?  Wasn’t he the one with the insights into who she was and what she liked that had helped him talk to her one-on-one so well?  When they were all together, wasn’t it James to whom Lily was always talking?  Second only to Marissa (and not third to Sirius), Lily talked to James the most readily, with the greatest ease.

            So Sirius broke up with Lily…very badly.

            That had, put simply, backfired.

            In hindsight, of _course_ , it would backfire fantastically.

            It wasn’t until the end of sixth year that Sirius understood why Lily had reacted _so_ badly.  Running, literally, smack into her while they were both out after hours, he had decided to have everything out with her in the middle of that corridor.  “Watch where you’re going, Sirius,” she had snapped in annoyance.

            “Oh, I’m Sirius, am I?”

            “What are you on about, madman?” Lily returned in annoyance.

            “Just, _Lily_ , that I’m a little confused why I’m Sirius and James is Potter when I’m the one that hurt you two years ago.  That’s what you’re still on about, right?” Truth be told, Sirius had known that it was not, strictly speaking, a good idea.  He was just too tired and still getting over his initial fright from their collision.  It wasn’t a recipe for good judgment.

            “Oh, you are so full of yourself,” she had narrowed her eyes at him.  “You think I’m still mooning over you?  It’s been two years, Sirius!  We dated for a month!  How pathetic do you think I am?  Or rather, how irresistible or whatever do you think you are?”  She made a sound of disgust and turned to leave.

            “Then what the hell is this about, Evans?  What the hell is going on?  We were friends, right?  We were all the best of friends!  We were all – why can’t we be like that again if there’s no problem?” Sirius yelled at her, heedless of the fact that they were out of bounds after hours and the shouting would almost certainly draw the attention of Filch.

            “Because any time I try to be friends with you boys you start throwing me at James!” Lily yelled back, equally heedless of their situation.  “And after the way he proved he has no respect for me I’m not even sure if I want to be his friend!”

            “No respect for you!” Sirius sputtered in shock.  “How can you say that?  He practically worships you!”

            “Oh, wake up,” Lily snapped, glaring at him.  “It was respect, was it, that made you boys decide that I couldn’t be trusted to decide who I date for myself then?  It was because he worships me, was it, that he completely disregarded my feelings?  That you boys treated my emotions like something that you had to _fix?_   That you decided his feelings should supersede mine?  You both respected and loved me enough to break my heart and expect me to like it?  What’s the matter with you!”

            Sirius was momentarily dumbfounded.  It was a good thing, really, that he didn’t have a ready retort, because then they wouldn’t have heard Mrs. Norris come around the bend or seen her lamp-like eyes fasten on them before she scurried off in search of Filch.  “Damn,” Sirius whispered, grabbing Lily’s arm and pulling her down a few corridors.  She followed without protesting, probably hoping that he would be able to get them back to the Tower safely.  She looked annoyed that his plan only went as far as an alcove hidden behind a tapestry, which they had all found in third year.  No…wait, he and Lily had found it toward the end of fourth year…on their third date.  Oh, damn it all.

            They waited in silence for several minutes, heard the nasty old caretaker go back and forth along the corridor several times, and finally heard him shuffle away muttering about escaping rule breakers.  When Sirius finally turned his attention back to Lily, he saw her sitting on the ground staring off into space.

            When she spoke, it was in a very quiet voice, “Do you know what the worst part is, Sirius?  He doesn’t even really want me anymore.”

            “What are you talking about, Lily?” Sirius sighed in frustration.

            “He doesn’t, Sirius!” Lily hissed.  “Think about it!  He can’t very well change his mind, can he?  You broke up with me for him.  James pursuing me is a testament to your friendship, he can’t just cast it away like it meant nothing.  When he asks me out, it’s not about me.  It’s about you.  Sometimes I almost think that I could like him the way you all want me to, Sirius, but…it’s just too hard.  And like I said, if he stopped wanting to date me, it’s not like he could ever say it.  All I want is my friends back, and you stupid boys won’t let me have it.  Because of how James feels, how I feel doesn’t matter.  And he doesn’t even feel that way about me anymore.”

            “Lily, how can you think –“

            “I’VE GOT YOU NOW, YOU LITTLE CRETINS!”

            Their eyes met for a moment in horror, then they burst through the tapestry and started sprinting for home, hearing Filch’s echoes behind them the entire way.

            So Sirius should have known that Lily wouldn’t be able to judge clearly whether or not someone still felt the same way about her.  Sirius had known that she was a horrible judge of character, that she was always too ready to believe that someone didn’t really care about her.  It was all about Petunia, who had once worshipped her and then hated her.  Well, that was a little simplistic, but it had started there.

            Sirius never should have believed Lily when she said she didn’t think that Marissa was really her friend anymore.  They shouldn’t have let Lily, of all people, be the one to decide if Marissa still cared about her the same way she always had.

            But Sirius had taken from that night in sixth year only the lesson not to underestimate Lily’s sense.  He hadn’t realized that she was still spouting nonsense about James, just of a different kind.  So he had taken her seriously from then on, and he hadn’t second-guessed her analysis of Marissa and Remus’s waning friendship.  He hadn’t taken a moment to wonder if it was more about her insecurity than their devotion.

**6\. Toujours Pur**

 

            Sirius had known that it would be hard; that it would, in fact, destroy him.  Not even because of his previous excursion with the cars.  Sirius Black knew what leaving would cost him because of Lily and Marissa.

            Their families had been ripped apart by forces quite beyond their control.  Lily’s mother could not recognize her, and Mrs. Evans’s unintentionally callous treatment of Petunia made the wall of resentment between the sisters insurmountable.

            But Lily went home during every holiday to see the sister who could not forgive her, the father who could barely pull himself out of his grief to look at her, and the mother who no longer knew her.

            Marissa had had every reason to leave her father far behind.  Her provocation – abuse and fear for her younger brother – was unquestionable.  She had even taken her younger brother with her when she left her father, fully intending to schism from him irrevocably and give up everything to do so until Dumbledore intervened and made a formal separation unnecessary.

            But Marissa went home every summer and most Christmases.  No, she did not bring Gus the first time and she stayed only a few days before scurrying back to the Potters for the rest of the holidays, but she went.  Even with all the justification to loathe her father and never see him again, she went back – sparingly, but always staying just long enough to preserve the illusion that she was still his daughter and merely visiting extended family for the rest of the holidays.

            The girls, who had every reason to pull away, went back because they knew the importance of family.

            Sirius had never doubted it, and now he saw evidence up close of how much damage it caused to forget or disregard that.

            It wasn’t something big that broke him.  In fact, for this to be what pushed him over the edge probably proved more than anything else that he was a masochist.  It was finding out what his mother and hers had done to Andromeda.

            Sirius had not been able to attend her wedding, and he hadn’t seen Andromeda or Ted since she finally broke with her family.  So it was only by overhearing his mother talking to his least favorite cousin Bellatrix that he would have known about their last revenge on his favorite cousin.

            “To think that she told us she would be ‘something,’” Bellatrix was laughing nastily.  “I just wish we could have neutered her as well so that she wouldn’t even have that little brat to toddle after.”

            “Oh, I think it is still a fitting demonstration of our power and her foolishness,” Walburga Black, nee Black, had said with a self-righteous nod.  Sirius, pinned inside the kitchen cupboard and forced to listen to their conversation on penalty of having to explain why he had been raiding the potions supplies, stared at them through the crack in the door.  “It really is too bad, she did have so much potential.  She was right about that.”

            “To think she really thought by leaving she would still be able to fulfill it!” Bellatrix had cackled.  That was when Sirius had realized.  Andy.  They were crowing about Andy.  She had a baby?  That was wonderful!  Sirius felt that sick, sinking feeling of shame that he could not be a part of her life – that by leaving she had cost him his favorite cousin and what he knew without a doubt would be his favorite first cousin once removed.

            “So she is really still sending out job applications?  Has she not gotten the point or does she just think we’ll get tired of blocking her?” his mother had said, completely blowing her son’s mind.  They had taken away Andy’s chance to work?  He had heard about her flight and her proud declaration on the doorstep that she would not be a useless, brainless trophy wife like the lot of them.  In doing so, it seemed that she had chosen the revenge that the Black women would exact on her for her defiance.  All her talent – Head Girl at Hogwarts – gone up in smoke to satisfy the ugly pride of two worthless old women and their “perfect” little protégé.

            The last time that Sirius had talked to Andy she had been thinking of going into International Relations – and damn if she wouldn’t have been fabulous at that.  They had taken it from her and were still vindictive enough to keep stopping her from getting a job, from being anything other than a housewife.  “She obviously has not yet realized that the malice of the Black Family against its enemies is endless,” his mother continued with another nasty laugh.  Sirius could not have put it better himself.

            That was when it snapped.  Being a part of _this_ was what he was clinging to by a thread?  _This_ was what he felt he could not leave behind?  He was sacrificing so much, not committing fully to his friends, his new beliefs, the loyalties he wanted so to embrace, so that he would not lose _these_ people?  These horrible, vicious harpies who had never done anything worthwhile with their lives and set out to ruin his favorite cousin’s dreams and ambitions because of it?

            He had thrown open to the door to the cupboard before he knew what he was doing.  “I’m leaving,” was all that he said.  Then he walked out the door.  They were both yelling things at him, but he did not hear them.  He just walked straight out into the street without looking back once, waving happily at Mr. Turner who actually smiled back, and never returned to the Noble and Most Ancient House of Black – at least while any of his family still lived.

            Just like that.  It was over.  They hadn’t run after him once he hit the street.  Their shrieks faded away into the distance.  No one came after him.  Of course, he had left everything there so they might have thought he was just taking a stroll around the block.  He wasn’t.

            He was three blocks away before he thought of how much trouble he was in stranded in the middle of London homeless with no Muggle money (or any wizarding money, for that matter) and only a passing knowledge of Muggle customs and the actual geography of the city.  Luckily, he remembered that Marissa was still with her father for a few more days and they lived in London, so he walked there.  He had to get a lot of directions and it took longer than he could have imagined at the start of it, but he at least knew the address from having sent letters, so he eventually made it.  He was about the same temperature as a popsicle, but at least it hadn’t been snowing at the time and Marissa had been thoughtful enough to have tea ready.

            As he walked, he looked up and down at the city that he had not known existed until that day.  The Muggle city.  The cars whooshing by, the motorcycles that suddenly seemed to be everywhere…

            And it was good.

            It was so simple and so final at once that it took quite awhile for the implications of what he had done to sink in on Sirius Black.  He rather enjoyed staying with the Potters for the rest of the Christmas holidays with James, Marissa and Mundungus.  The Potters were quite used to taking in strays by this point.

            But he had raised his hand to greet Regulus in the Great Hall the first night back and had to realize with a start that he hadn’t thought to bring his brother along the way that Marissa had.  His brother wouldn’t have come if he had.  He had to realize halfway through a letter to his parents to arrange for Easter Holidays that of course he wouldn’t send it.  He spoke to Slughorn and realized that the Potions Master was no longer half so interested in a disinherited outcast than he was in the heir to the Noble and Most Ancient House of Black.  It took quite a while for Sirius to realize what this meant.  When it finally settled fully on his shoulders, he wrote to Andromeda and learned the name of her daughter.

            The ways in which it destroyed him also manifested themselves slowly.  The biggest one, however, was when he finally managed, a month after walking out on his family in December, to fully transform into an animal.  It was a large, noble black dog, just like the ones on the crest of _Toujours Pur_.

 

**7\. Marissa Fletcher-Lupin, Spy**

 

            Lily had once, in the giddiness of her new relationship with James, decided that she should pair up her best friend the way that Marissa had (at last) successfully done with her.  They had all stared at her for a moment in shock that she had not suggested the obvious pairing of Marissa and Remus.  Perhaps it had been her idea of a joke, but when she told Sirius and Marissa that they would make an absolutely darling couple, they had just stared at each other in mild shock for a long moment.  Remus had looked up from his book to stare at them.

            “Well, I suppose it could work,” Sirius said, deciding to make a large joke out of a small stupidity.  “I mean, we do have a lot in common,” he said, gesturing for Marissa to invite her into the joke.

            “True,” she joined in happily.  “We’re both brilliant, of course, and breathtakingly good-looking.”

            “We’re both from old families which are practically royalty in our separate worlds,” Sirius added.

            “We’ve both turned our backs on those families,” Marissa nodded.

            “We both have younger brothers,” Sirius offered.

            “Who adored us,” Marissa replied.

            “But no longer seem to need us the same way.”

            “We’re both funny.”

            “We’re both troublemakers.”

            “We’re both in shock that I was made a prefect.”

            “We’re both stunned that Dumbledore made Lily and James Head Boy and Girl.”

            “We’ve both been trying to get those two together for too long.”

            “We’ve both been accused of dating James.”

            “We’re both repulsed by that idea.”

            “We have more manners than the rest of these idiots combined.”

            “We both know how to ballroom dance.”

            “I thought we’d both agreed not to talk about that.”

            “Neither of us keeps promises.”

            “We have a lovely, witty repartee going with just about everyone, especially each other.”

            “We’re impeccable at following each other’s leads…”

            They paused and looked at each other for a moment.

            Then they shuddered in disgust, in unison.  “Uh, it’d be like kissing yourself!” Sirius said, sticking out his tongue at this prospect.

            “It’d be practically masturbation!” Marissa cried.

            “I wanted to say that!” Sirius exclaimed.

            “But was too afraid of offending Lily’s sensitive ears,” they chorused.  Their eyes had met again, and they stood.  “I gotta go,” they said together and left in separate directions.  All for the gag, of course.  Love of the gag was probably the main thing that they shared.

            What they had been saying was true, however.  Marissa, more than any of the other members of the Gryffindor Six, understood him.  She came from the Muggle version of his world, of his family.  She was what he could have been if he had handled everything better.  If he had made as much use of his fresh start at Hogwarts as she had, he could have been like her.

            Over the years, that had become twisted.  Sirius knew how easily he could have become Dark, the enemy of everything that he wanted to be and everyone that he loved.  He knew that he would have been an honored member of the Dark Lord’s circle, a useful spy trusted as he was by crucial members of the Order of the Phoenix.

            It broke Sirius’s heart to think of Marissa as a traitor.

            Not the girl who had stood outside of the Chocolate Room with him waiting for James and Lily to emerge, spraying them down with blasts of water from their wands once they did stroll out hand in hand.  Not the girl who gave him tea and comforted him after he ran away from his family, who understood what that meant even when he didn’t and was there for him in the hundreds of tiny ways he wouldn’t admit he needed.  Not the girl who had spun around so fast that their entire Herbology class fell over because he had dared her to do it.  Not the girl who had snuck her little brother into Hogwarts twice and tried to quit school to save him.  Not the girl who had spent her recovery time in the hospital cheering all of them up.  Not the girl who had painted James Potter’s face in the sky and, two years later, turned the entire fan club into copies of their idol in the middle of a Quidditch match.  Not the girl who had brought his brother’s body back to him, knowing how much he would need to be the one to bury it.

            But the Slytherins.

            She had always been unafraid of the Slytherins.

            She had always _trusted_ the Slytherins.

            She had always let them hurt her and done nothing.  Lucius Malfoy had tried to _rape_ her, and she had not let them report it or even personally punish him.  Severus Snape had broken her heart, yet she had gone back to him.  Narcissa Black had mocked her mercilessly, but she befriended her.  She had opened herself up to be hurt again and again.  She went into the house of the man that had tried to destroy her every Sunday for tea.

            Was she insane?  She was sick, weakened, and, though stubborn, completely untested against the Imperius Curse.  It would have been easy, at any of those meetings, to surprise her and put her under the spell before she even knew what was happening.  From there, the Malfoys could use her like a scalpel.  She had grown quieter, in a way that her first bout with cancer had not produced.  And if she went there, Remus…would Remus follow her into hell?

            It would have been so easy, with the way she walked brazenly into their manor without a thought, to turn her into a spy.  A charming, trusted, sympathetic spy.

            That was the thought that crept into his mind slowly and gathered speed until it was a train rushing into what felt so much like certainty it was intoxicating in a world of such constant chronic doubt, even if it was really only the thrill of an easy way out of an impossible situation.  Believing Marissa had been tricked, when she had been the one who had Malfoy’s number from the beginning and had tamed Snivellus for the better part of two years, was so much easier than thinking that Peter might have betrayed them.  Thinking that Remus would follow her was hard, but easier than…the alternative.

            On Halloween night, Peter had turned up at Sirius’s flat and told him that the Potters needed to bring a package to Dumbledore.  Sirius, to keep up the pretense that he was their Secret Keeper, brought it up to Hogwarts.  On the way, he saw Remus Lupin and walked away.  Because it was easier.  Because he had already acted on the decision, and it was too late to turn around.  Because he didn’t know that the angel he had slandered was dead under the Dark Mark.

            When Sirius reached the Headmaster’s office, his world slowly began to fall apart, though he didn’t know it.  Sirius Black could have no way of knowing that as Dumbledore unwrapped that package, he was unwrapping all of the secrets that had been stored away for years, causing so much pain.  When James’s Invisibility Cloak slid out onto the desk, Sirius had no way of knowing the truths that were about to spill into his lap at last – too late to stop the cataclysm.  He did not know, as he saw Dumbledore pick up the book hidden inside the Invisibility Cloak, that it was already too late.  He had already made the terrible choices that would determine the rest of his life.

            Sirius did not know this, so he was able to watch as Dumbledore read the inside of the book cover, without grief and guilt crushing all thought out of him.  “Ah, Miss Fletcher…I did not think that I would see your handiwork again,” Dumbledore said sadly, though his eyes twinkled fondly down at the inside cover of the book.

            “Professor?” Sirius said in surprise.

            Dumbledore looked startled, something Sirius couldn’t remember seeing before.  “Well, I suppose it does not matter now if her secrets come to light,” he said after a moment of considering Sirius.  “And you are her friend, you will appreciate the unique touches that she put into her messages.  She was truly extraordinary.”

            Sirius took the book numbly, protesting slightly, “But this came from Lily and James.”  But there was no denying Marissa Fletcher’s handwriting.  “What…”

            “Mrs. Lupin seems to have left a message for me, though she seems to have delivered it through Mr. and Mrs. Potters rather than the usual manner,” Dumbledore told him simply.  Sirius wondered idly, for his mind did not seem to be working properly on the most vital train of thought, if Dumbledore had realized that he had called Marissa “Miss Fletcher” a moment ago.  He wasn’t ready for any other thoughts cascading confusedly through his head to form themselves into words.

            “You talk to Marissa?”

            “Oh yes, she was the second-most inventive code-creator that I have ever worked with and, I must say, that is truly saying something,” Dumbledore replied.  “I will miss her.”

            “Why?  Why will you miss her?” Sirius asked dumbly, too many past tenses puncturing his state of deliberate stupidity.

            “She was an extremely useful agent, Mr. Black,” Dumbledore said sadly.  “A uniquely placed spy, perfectly camouflaged to undertake certain missions in broad daylight, and as I have said before, she could be endlessly amusing in her creation of codes.  How many fools and wise men would she have beguiled simply by placing a meaningless ‘B4’ at the end of the message, implying it was a numeric code?  Equal parts ingenious and infantile, much like she was in life.  A deadly combination.  More than any of that, however, Mrs. Lupin is a person to be missed regardless of her effort for the War.”

            Sirius looked up from Marissa’s handwriting to Dumbledore’s uncharacteristically twinkle-free eyes.  He felt as if Dumbledore had just shattered his entire world.  “Marissa was-“

            “Working for me, Sirius, yes,” Dumbledore said gently.  “I hoped that you at least suspected that this was the case.”  Dumbledore looked twice as mournful now as he regarded the young man looking back at him as if he had just told him that Santa Claus was real and had been killed because he left the loose shingles up on his roof.

            “Why did you tell me this now?” Sirius gasped, the effort of staying upright in his chair taking every ounce of his strength.

            “Her death rather removed the need for secrecy,” Dumbledore said quietly, looking down and taking the book back from Sirius.  “Her husband had already announced his resignation from service a week ago.”

            Sirius Black broke in that moment.  He sobbed wildly and uncontrollably into his hands.  Sirius Black had never sobbed before.  He had cried: he had shed tears for his family silently into his pillow for hours when no one would hear; he had let tears roll down his face as he stood absolutely still at the death of Gideon and Fabian Prewett, Marlene McKinnon and, yes, Regulus.  Now he could barely breathe for sobbing into his hands.  Marissa Fletcher was dead.  Too many past tenses had given him warning, Dumbledore telling him her secrets had confirmed the fear, but to actually hear the words shattered his strength, perhaps his very soul.  She had died knowing that he believed her a traitor.  That last conversation…he had known she was dying.  He had betrayed her, and now she was gone forever, never to allow him to apologize, to say how terribly he had wronged her.  His old friend was gone, and he had left her out in the cold after all the times she had taken him in out of it.

            Sirius was barely aware of Dumbledore’s presence even when he walked behind him and put a hand on his shoulder.

            But he felt the hand and, with it, came a knowledge as terrible as the previous realization had been painful.

            Sirius Black leapt to his feet and, without another word to Dumbledore, bolted for the door.  He sprinted down the hall, taking every conceivable secret passageway that he could.  He arrived at the mirror on the fourth floor and had to say the password three times before it came out as anything but rushed gibberish.  Once he was inside, he ran full out down it, sprinting as fast as he could to Hogsmeade where he could Apparate to Peter’s and stop him.

            He was beginning to regret his chosen route halfway down the passage, cursing that he hadn’t taken the one-eyed witch – blast if Honeydukes discovered him! – just about when he realized that if he could just go up three feet he would be standing on Hogsmeade ground and able to Apparate.  That was when an impatient Sirius Black got a very bad idea.  He took out his wand and blasted his way up through the ceiling and, coughing and sputtering and nearly crushed under large boulders, he emerged onto the High Street several minutes later.

            Before he could even see if the passageway would continue to collapse, he was gone.

            It took twenty precious minutes to determine that Peter was not home or anywhere else he should have been.  It took another five to determine that tracking him would be impossible.

            The Potters had warded the whole of Godric’s Hollow to prevent Apparition or Disapparition, with the permission of the town, as one of their first acts when going into hiding.  So Sirius Apparated to where he had left his very own, precious, flying motorcycle just on the edge of where he could Apparate.

            As he surged it forward and directly into the air, heedless of any Muggles who might be watching for the first time since he was fourteen, Sirius could only pray that he had not been stupid for too long.  It was a long, biting icy ride that left him far too much time to deliberate on the fact that it had been him who first suspected Marissa and then, by extension, Remus.  It had been he who provided the tempting alternative of Marissa being tricked and Imperiused, meaning that no one had actually turned their backs on the Gryffindor Six.  It had been Sirius Black who had chosen to believe Marissa and Remus Lupin were the traitors in their midst.

            So when Sirius Black saw the ruin of the Potters’ house below him, he knew that it was his fault.  He had been the one who began to see the Lupins so ignorantly, so stupidly, so terribly.  He had killed the Potters.

 

_In your eyes, I wanted to see a second chance.  I wanted you to look me in the eyes and tell me that you would have done the same thing, that it hadn’t been me alone, and that it wouldn’t cost me everyone that I loved.  But your eyes were blank and unseeing by the time that I reached them, and it would have been a lie even if you had said it._

 

            Sirius Black had thought that Marissa Lupin was a very different kind of spy.  He should have known that Marissa was never quite what she seemed.  After all, she was just like him.  Loyalty was the only thing that mattered.

            And he was the one who had betrayed her to the death of them all.

 

**8\. Peter Pettigrew, twice and ten thousand times**

 

            Sirius Black had not, initially, thought much of Peter Pettigrew.  He had been skeptical when James agreed to bring him into the Prank War.  He had grudgingly admitted that if the girls had a spy in their own dormitory a spy on their spy would certainly be useful.  It made him laugh madly, to think how Marissa, Remus and Peter had all been spies so early and how they should have known that they would be spies later.

            Sirius Black laughed because otherwise he would sob again, and he would not be able to think.

            The only time that Sirius had felt truly on the same page as the slower, shiftier, less prideful Peter Pettigrew was when James figured out that Remus was a werewolf.  Peter had sat there looking horrified and trying not to show it.  Sirius was better at hiding it, that had been the only difference.  But when they had told the stammering, panicking Remus that it was “cool” – or James had – Peter had come up with the solution.

            They had all wanted one.  “You think we could cure it?” Sirius had asked.  “We know we’re brilliant students and I’m not saying we could do it tomorrow or anything…”

            “Or just make it better!” Peter had piped up.

            “How could we do that?” Sirius had asked, wanting to help.  He wanted to free his friend of this affliction, wanted to free him of the disease that made him want to draw away from Remus in fear and revulsion.

            “Well, what if we could be there with him?” Peter had suggested tentatively.

            “NO!” Remus had yelled, leaping to his feet.  “No!  You don’t know what it’s like!  You can’t!  I forbid you to ever –“

            “I don’t mean let you Bite us!” Peter had positively squealed.  “Or even go down there unprotected.  I just mean…what if we found a way…I mean, we know that McGonagall is the one who actually takes you into the Willow to the Shack – in her cat form, right?  Because, even if something went wrong, you wouldn’t attack her like that, right?  So what if we…well, I mean, I don’t think we could do it tomorrow but…”

            Sirius laughed wildly because how could they not have even suspected the boy whose true form was a rat?  Oh, he was good to have gotten them to trust him enough that they didn’t even see that.

            They had been dazzled by his adoration of them.  The light of Peter’s worshipful gaze had been so bright it had blinded them to the earnest gratitude and devotion of Remus, simply because it shone like a candle beside a firecracker.  Peter had always been playing them, feeding their egos and making himself useful, even indispensable.  From the very beginning.

            At first, all he had wanted was their friendship.  Their protection.  He had always possessed the ability to decipher, with an utterly cool head, which side would benefit him more.  Hadn’t he turned from Marissa and Remus’s side to James and Sirius’s when it looked more profitable?  When he thought Sirius and James were the better allies to have within Gryffindor?

            Sirius laughed like a fool, because he had been a fool for a boy who stoked his ego.  He was a blind fool because the eyes that gazed at him had seemed spellbound by his brilliance.  Sirius laughed harder than he had sobbed when he finally managed, through eyes that refused to see, to land alongside the refuse of the Potters’ destroyed cottage in Godric’s Hollow.

            Hagrid was already there, a dark mass against the wreckage.  “Drop your wand and put your hands over your head!” Sirius had roared at the Death Eater or scavenger poking around the Potters’ home, not at all sure that he would refrain from firing the most horrid spell that sprang to mind, even if they complied with his demand.  And if it was, however unlikely given the size, Peter Pettigrew…

            “Yeh’ll be lucky if I don’ rib ya limb from limb!” a roar came back at him as the dark man turned around to face him.

            “Hagrid?” Sirius gasped, dropping his wand and feeling distinctly deprived that he could not attack now.  Especially when he heard a baby start to cry.  Sirius fell to his knees, landing on his wand and causing it to crack in two.  He did not care.  Harry was alive…

            “Black?  Sirius Black?” Hagrid asked, approaching cautiously.  “How’d ya ‘ear?”

            “Riss-Riss wasn’t…” Sirius felt the sobs coming back and tried to speak through them.  “Riss…she wasn’t the one who betrayed us…I-I had to tell…”  It was probably best, he had thought, that it didn’t all come spilling out.

            Sirius later laughed at his lingering egotistical idiocy, thinking that Hagrid would be the one not to be trusted at the end of this night.  Hagrid was probably there so quickly, Sirius realized hours after it was too late to be of use to him, because of the way he had blown out of Dumbledore’s office.  _He_ would be the one to whom Hagrid would be glad later that he had not spilled all the beans.

            “There, there,” Hagrid said, thumping him powerfully on the back.  “Ya really thought it was ‘er then?  Wha’ the war does to friends…and it’s over too late for yours…”

            “Not Harry?  Harry survived?” Sirius gasped, looking up at the bawling baby in Hagrid’s arms.  “How?”

            “Who knows?  But You-Know-Who ‘as gone, dead or crippled by whatever it was,” Hagrid said grimly.  “Any idea how to comfort ‘im? ‘Arry, I mean.”

            “Give him to me,” Sirius said, reaching out imploring arms for Harry Potter, the last Potter, the Potter that had survived – not because Sirius had saved them, but survived in any case.  Survived despite Sirius’s stupidity and blindness and arrogance…

            Hagrid hesitated.  Sirius should have known then.  “Funny faces,” Sirius choked.  “I always make funny faces at him.  He always laughs, just like James used to laugh, before the War.”  Sirius rose to his feet and turned to look up at Harry who, in Hagrid’s arms, was taller than Sirius.  Grimacing terribly, Sirius tried to make the goofy faces that he had made in the midst of hundreds of serious, grim conversations with Harry’s parents in the past year.  He could barely do it.

            “Seeree!” Harry had clapped his hands then reached out for his godfather.  Sirius reached out to take Harry’s wee hands in his own, but he did not attempt to pluck him out of Hagrid’s arms.

            “I’m his godfather, Hagrid,” Sirius told the giant, not taking his eyes from Harry’s tiny version of Lily Potter’s eyes.  “Lily and James…Lily and James asked me to…asked me to…if they…”  Sirius could not get it out, he could barely breathe with the acrid smell of the burning wreckage piercing his lungs.  All that was left of the Potters’ cottage.

            “Dumbledore said ‘e’s to go to his aunt and uncle’s,” Hagrid said firmly but sympathetically.  “I’ve got me orders, Sirius.  There’s nothin’ I can…”

            Sirius nearly laughed aloud, because even in the moment when he knew what Peter was, what he had done to them all, he had still played directly into his hands – running away from Dumbledore immediately after learning a vital secret less than an hour before the Potters were killed.  He wanted to laugh as helplessly as he sobbed.  To think that they had thought Peter the weakest of the Marauders!  The least important, the least clever, the least special.  Peter had outsmarted them all so thoroughly that even when they knew what he had done, none of them could escape.

            It was too late to save the Potters.  It was probably too late to clear his name.  But if he still had time to kill Peter, to keep Peter from fooling and hurting them anymore, that would be enough.

            Sirius nearly laughed, the laughter of the damned, at the fact that he did not even care anymore that the War was over.  He did not care if he was killed or worse the moment after he had eliminated Peter, the most dangerous, the most cunning, the most Slytherin of the Marauders.

            Sirius actually let out the dignified chuckle of the Blacks in front of Hagrid, realizing that it was prejudice after all, that did him in.  It was pride and defense of family, even if it was a chosen family rather than an assumed one.  It was a different kind of unyielding prejudice that had done him in.  Peter Pettigrew had used all that the Blacks had made him…to make him prejudiced against those who seemed weak, talentless…like they assumed all Muggleborns must be.  Peter had made him protect the weak and prejudiced against those who kept alliances in Old Families.  Sirius laughed his Family’s dark chuckle because the desire that rose within him was to blast Wormtail off the Marauder’s Map like he had been blasted off the Family tapestry.

            Hagrid looked at him oddly when he heard the chuckle and shifted uneasily from one foot to another.  “Take my bike to get him to his aunt and uncle’s, Hagrid,” Sirius told him seriously.  “I won’t be needing it anymore.”

            “Are-are you sure, Sirius?” Hagrid seemed shocked by his offer.  Sirius wasn’t surprised.  The flying motorcycle that symbolized his freedom and hope and a chance to be a free man…

            It was no longer appropriate.  “If there are any of Voldemort’s lieutenants bent on revenge, it will be nearly impossible to trace.  It’ll get you there fast enough…just promise me he’ll be safe there, Hagrid.”

            “Otherwise Dumbledore wouldn’ send ‘im,” Hagrid said staunchly.  Sirius nodded and handed over the keys.  Then he bent down into the wreckage, looking for a lost wand that he could use to carry out the vengeance of the Marauders.  Could he find James’s mahogany wand or Lily’s new ebony wand that she had acquired after her old one snapped in the midst of a battle?

            No, it was not to be a wand of a member of the Gryffindor Six that helped Sirius Black in his quest for Wormtail.  Instead, Sirius found a yew wand, thirteen and a half inches, after fifteen minutes of searching.  It was not a Potter’s wand.  Sirius’s hand trembled to be holding what was almost certainly Lord Voldemort’s wand, the wand that had killed Lily and James Potter and tried to kill Harry.

            And it would kill Peter Pettigrew.

            If Dumbledore suspected him, as Sirius would not entirely blame him for doing, he would not be able to go home or anywhere else to acquire a different wand to replace the one he had barely noticed snapping as he fell to the ground in grief.  So it was Voldemort’s wand or nothing.  The wand seemed to be able to feel how much he hated it, for he barely managed to Apparate out, even with the Anti-Apparition ward long broken.

            Sirius searched for hours, impeded at every turn by the protesting wand.  He searched for hours because he had underestimated Peter’s sense of romanticism and his cleverness.  He thought that Peter would be hiding.  No, Peter would be waiting.  Peter would wait, not where Sirius would have looked for him, but where Peter would have looked for Sirius if their positions had been reversed.

            Sirius laughed in grim triumph when he realized, almost a full day of searching and dodging Order members and Aurors, that Peter was arranging a trap to solidify his story even farther with the powers that were once more in control of the wizarding world.  So Sirius began to go to the places where he would have hidden out.  He went to the most public places first.

            It was in the middle of Grimmauld Place that Sirius heard the traitor’s voice begin to bleat.  Standing in front of Mr. Turner’s house, quickly drawing a crowd as he screamed, was Peter Pettigrew.  “SIRIUS BLACK!  HOW COULD YOU?”

            It would really play well with this crowd too, what Peter had in mind.  The problem was that, for the first time in years, Sirius had the upper hand.  He did not care if Peter’s story was believed, did not care that this was obviously a trick to fool the Ministry.  As long as he killed him first, the Ministry could believe anything that they wanted.  That was the advantage that Peter did not know – that Sirius knew that it was a trap and did not care.  He would eat the bait eagerly even if he had to swallow the hook.

            “LILY AND JAMES, SIRIUS!” Peter was screaming, and it was amazing how easy it was to forget that Peter was a fabulous actor.  “LILY AND JAMES!”

            Sirius drew Voldemort’s wand and fingered it behind his back, savoring the moment he had to wait before he could strike Peter down.  Mr. Turner and his wife were too close for him to be sure, with such an unreliable wand, that he would not hurt them.  But the crowd was gathering fast at the name of Black, and soon it would be even more difficult.

            It was so easy to forget that Peter had been the quickest at learning nonverbal spells.  Without so much as a change of expression, Peter had disarmed Sirius.  “LILY AND JAMES!  HOW COULD YOU BETRAY THEM?”

            Sirius launched himself forward, ready to tackle Peter to the ground and kill him with his bare hands, witnesses be damned, but it was so easy to forget with Peter Pettigrew.  So easy to forget that Peter had a wand and he did not.

            A tremendous explosion robbed all sight and sound for the several crucial seconds that were all that Peter would need to escape.  When Sirius recovered his ability to see, the carnage on the street, most notably the separated head of Mr. Turner and assorted limbs of many other old neighbors Sirius once knew by the make and model of their cars, stole his attention another several crucial seconds.  He took a halting step forward and heard the sound of breaking glass, which turned out to be Mr. Turner’s wire-rimmed glasses.

            Sirius laughed in shock, because the first thought he had had was that Mr. Turner was right, all those years ago, to be afraid of him.  He had gotten him killed all these years later, for the crime of befriending a young Black unknowingly.  Blacks were always the death of Muggles, whatever they did and whatever path they chose.  Andromeda would be the death of her Ted someday.

            As Sirius heard the pops that announced law enforcement arriving, he looked to where Voldemort’s wand had fallen.  It was gone.  So Wormtail the Rat had saved it for his master.

            Then Sirius laughed, laughed like a madman, for he had realized that he had been fooled yet again by the sanest, coolest head that he had ever met.  Peter didn’t want to escape him and be even more trusted by Dumbledore and the Ministry by playing Sirius’s revenge attempt just right.  Peter needed to be a martyr, or he would be the second most pursued target of those who lost everything when Voldemort fell, after only Harry Potter.  He had to hide from those who would think he had double-crossed them.  Even after everything, Sirius had underestimated him again.

            So he stood there, unarmed and beaten, laughing.

            Sirius laughed and laughed because it took Peter Pettigrew to show him: he was still a Black, through and through; he could not escape their grip any more than Andromeda; James Potter had only changed his prejudices, not eradicated them; Remus had been too loyal to Dumbledore even to clear his name; Lily was perhaps the most fallible and susceptible to partnering a mole in their entire Order; Marissa was working for Dumbledore; and Peter Pettigrew had outsmarted him time and time again, used him as a pawn in a game Sirius could not even fathom until it was too late…

_In your eyes, I am a fool.  
 _

            And little Peter Pettigrew was right again.  He had fallen for it every time.  Little Wormtail had outsmarted him at every turn, outsmarted him so well that he hadn’t even known he had done it until it was too late.

            So Sirius Black laughed like a fool.

            Laughed like an idiot.

            Laughed like a madman.

            He laughed like the condemned killer that everyone would think him to be.  And somewhere below him, a rat with a missing toe ran down through the sewers dragging the wand that had killed Lily and James Potter behind him.

            Sirius Black laughed, because he could think clearly when he laughed and not when he sobbed.  He laughed, because he would not laugh again for twelve years.

            Not until he heard Peter Pettigrew make much such a feeble attempt at the grand deceptions of the Old Days that he let out a bark of Black laughter.  He would not laugh until he knew that the Rat had been caught – because all he could do when it came to Peter Pettigrew now was laugh.  Laugh because Peter Pettigrew in the Shrieking Shack was as pathetic as he had thought he was twelve years before, when he had underestimated him so terribly.  Finally, the joke was funny again.  The tables had at last been turned.


	12. Remus: The Reason I Need You

**A/N:** There’s a scene in here that is dedicated to Miranda, if you’re reading.  Believe me, you’ll know which one.  Oh, and if anyone’s reading, letting me know would be a real kindness.  I want a reason to work on this piece with everything else that I have going in my life right now.

**Chapter Eleven**

**The Reason I Need You**

            Madam Rosemerta had been the first person to ask if they were dating, the first to suggest that he ask her out, and the first person that they invited to their wedding.

            That was why, Marissa told him later, she had taken Snape to the Hog’s Head rather than The Three Broomsticks.  Madam Rosemerta and her pub belonged to the Marauders, the Gryffindor Six, and the days of Marissa and Remus.

            Remus had always felt the same way.  That was why, after he had spoken to Lily at Marissa’s grave, he had traveled all the way to Hogsmeade for a drink.  He could have staggered into any number of watering holes along the way, but he wanted the Three Broomsticks, where he and Marissa had been kicked out for fighting on the day of their graduation, where James and Sirius had managed to con hard liquor out of the cheerful barmaid at the age of fourteen, where they had spent every Hogsmeade weekend together not so long ago, and where they had had the rehearsal dinner for both the Lupin and the Potter weddings.

            “Hello, Rosie,” Remus said when he plopped himself down at the bar near the window.

            “Hello, Remus,” Madam Rosemerta said with a small, sad smile.

            “It finally felt apart, Rosie,” he said quietly.  “Don’t give me any of that colored water this time.”

            Again Rosemerta’s face formed that small, sad smile that she obviously wished could grow into a laugh as it once had done so often for the Marauders.  “I haven’t tried that since you were fifteen years old, and you know it.  Stop trying to poison my business, Lupin.”  As she spoke, she placed a glass on the bar and poured firewhiskey into it.

            Remus lifted it to his mouth, then spoke softly as he stared into his depths as if they held answers, “They really thought she’d betrayed them.  She died knowing that they didn’t trust her.”  Then he took a very large swallow and looked back at Madam Rosemerta.

            She grasped his hand for a brief moment.  Remus Lupin’s face twisted itself into a fair imitation of his old smirk, but it is like a light seen through water – a wry smile seen through grief.  “Rosie Adams touched me,” he said, in a similarly incomplete imitation of his boyish tone.

            Again, Madam Rosemerta seemed only able to offer a twisted, sorrowful smile of her own.

-*-*- 

            “I just said she was pretty!” Remus protested, throwing up his hands as if to ward off the attack of the two girls who were regarding him like a new favorite project.  The three boys sat just behind him, snickering at Remus’s distress at the girls’ teasing.

            “And offered to go get the drinks,” Lily pointed out.  “And the lunch.  You didn’t even bring enough money to pay for all of that!”

            “And you’ve been to the loo three times,” Marissa said.

            “So what if – don’t track my loo habits!” Remus sputtered at her.

            “I’m just pointing out that you took the long way, all the way around the bar, every trip,” Marissa said with a mischievous glint in her eyes.  “Someone’s got a cru-ush…”

            “If you weren’t a girl I might give you a crush,” Remus muttered darkly.  Sirius howled and the girls giggled at that, but Remus only moodily turned back around to his food.  He stubbornly pretended that he could neither see nor hear them as he finished his lunch, making rather a meal out of not looking in any direction where Mistress Rosemerta might be at that moment.

            At least, he ignored them until Sirius suddenly made a desperate gagging sound accompanied by frantic motions at his throat, which had apparently come off rather the worst for Sirius’s tendency to swallow food practically whole with the speed of a rabid badger.  There was quite a bit of frantic flailing about and not just by the choking Sirius.  Remus was the only one to actually attempt to pound him on the back, but his futile efforts were cut short a moment later when Sirius collapsed to his knees on the ground, frantically clawing at his throat as his face turned a violent red.

            “I’ve got him!” a female voice broke in a moment later, diving down to the ground and heaving Sirius to his feet by wrapping her arms around his middle.  Mistress Rosemerta, a busty young woman in her mid-twenties, proceeded to perform what Marissa and Lily later told him the Muggles called the Heimlich maneuver on the customer she was mortified at having choked.

            When his fussing friends had settled a dazed Sirius back into his chair, he flung a melodramatic arm over his face.  “Am I dead?  I must be dead and gone to heaven!  I saw my life flash before my eyes!” he was crying in a highly unnecessarily dramatic way.

            “Come now, Sirius,” Remus said, his panic subsided and his good sense returning to take up its accustomed place.  “You didn’t even turn that red.  You weren’t about to die.”

            “No, not that,” Sirius waved away his life-and-death situation carelessly.  Then he removed the hand and smirked full-force up at Remus Lupin, “Because _Rosie Adams_ _touched me!_ ”  He gave a great bark of a laugh.  “Jealous, Moony?”

            From the way that all of his friends burst into laughter, Remus deduced that they had been planning that gag while he was studiously (and stupidly) ignoring them.  He was tempted to do so again, but he had rather learned his lesson about using that particular tactic with the Gryffindor Six.

-*-*- 

            The right to call Madam Rosemerta “Rosie” was something that all of the Marauders claimed.  No one else ever called her that.  Her husband and a few other cherished friends called her “Rose” on occasion, but the Gryffindor Six insisted that their pet name for Madam Rosemerta proved their close relationship with her.  In a way, they might have been right.  She was endlessly amused by them, served them alcohol at a very early age, felt free to trick them and prank them herself, and worried about them at school and in the War.

            It also meant that “Rosie” knew who to owl when James turned up already sloshed from his visit to the Hog’s Head and kept trying to order more mead when he could barely stand or even stagger about the place anymore.  It meant that she didn’t kick him out into the cold until the other three Marauders arrived and managed to carry him out under their arms.

            “I’m not entirely sure if I should serve you,” Madam Rosemerta told Remus even as she refilled his glass.  “You’re not going to pull a James on me, are you?”

            “I only get quieter as I get drunk,” Remus told him.

            “Should I believe a Marauder?” Madam Rosemerta asked with a smirk, the question a dull echo of what she had said many times before, many years and many lifetimes ago.

            “You’ll have the chance the find out, Rosie,” Remus promised her.  “But I don’t have anyone for you to owl if I am lying.” 

-*-*-

            It was the first night that James had returned to Hogwarts after taking three weeks off to help his mother settle his father’s affairs.  Despite their best efforts, they had lost track of him.  James had used the very simple method telling the boys, who had after much protesting had gotten Lily to agree to let them handle him the first night, that he needed to see his girlfriend.  He was gone long before the boys stumbled down into the Common Room and saw Lily sitting anxiously with Marissa completely sans James.

            They had been in a blind panic until they received Madam Rosemerta’s owl.  “We’ll get him, girls, can you bring a Hangover Potion and his cloak down the village, Lily?” Sirius had said, already sprinting out of the Portrait Hole with the other three fast behind him.

            By the time that the rest of the Marauders reached the Three Broomsticks, James had apparently managed to grab unfinished mead off of several departing patron’s tables and was being wrestled by one of Madam Rosemerta’s larger employees to keep him seated.  Everyone looked distinctly relieved that the boys had come to rescue James from the pub – and the pub’s inhabitants from him.

            Sirius and Remus both threw one of James’s arms around their shoulders and lifted him up as they staggered out of the pub, Peter struggled with the door and finally forced it open to allow them to stumble into the wildly blowing snow and icy wind.  If it woke James up from his drunken stupor at all, it was to a very slight degree.

            They stumbled in the heavy snow, lucky to get James into an alley where they were blocked at least a little from the wind before they buckled under his dead weight and all three fell to their knees.  The three lucid Marauders quickly tried to assess the situation.   He was farther gone than they had ever seen him before and they hadn’t managed to carry him far with him pushing and yanking them in opposite directions every few seconds.

            “Shit, James!” Sirius cried as he looked over his friends slobbering state.  James did not help matters by trying to lay down with a pile of dirty snow for a pillow.  As Remus and Sirius hauled him up again by his shoulders, Sirius continued to rant, “I don’t know if even Lily will be able to do a Sobering Spell powerful enough to deal with this!  Are you trying to kill yourself?”  In answer, James tried to lay down again and Sirius jerked him up again.  “Don’t do that!” he scolded, looking terribly afraid for his best friend – for more than one reason.

            “Wha’s it matter?” James mumbled, settling on each of their faces occasionally almost certainly entirely by accident.  “I planned the bloody funeral and I signed all the damn papers.  What more do they want from me?  What more can they want from me?  It doesn’t matter any more if I kill myself now.”

            “It matters to us!” Peter squeaked in near panic as he regarded his idol.

            “There are better ways to grieve, mate,” Remus said seriously because he was the responsible one, the prefect.  Even if James was Head Boy this year, Remus was still the prefect of the Marauders.  He and Marissa were assigned to be the voices of reason long before Lily and James gained power.

            “Leave me alone!” James waved them off as they tried to pull him to his feet again.  “Let me just stay here and rot!  No one will care any more!”

            “What about your mother, James?” Lily staggered up at that moment, a particularly pale Marissa Fletcher leaning against her.  Peter sprang forward to slide under Marissa’s arm so that Lily could kneel down and take James’s face in her hands.  “What about me?” she said, trying to catch James’s disoriented eyes with her own  worried ones.

            “You hate me,” James muttered wildly.

            “I don’t hate you, James,” Lily said, sounding as if her heart were breaking.

            “LIAR!” James suddenly roared, breaking away and staggering to his feet.

            “James!” Lily shouted, trying to stop him.  “He wouldn’t want you to act like this!  This is not what your father would want for you!”

            “I DON’T CARE WHAT HE’D WANT ANYMORE!” James yelled wildly, trying to take a step forward but falling straight down to be caught by Lily, Sirius and Remus before he could come crashing down and take Lily with him.  “IT DOESN’T MATTER WHAT HE’D WANT ANYMORE, DOES IT?  HE’S DEAD, ISN’T HE!”

            Then James was sobbing and struggling ineffectually until Lily finally hit him with a powerful Sobering Spell.  He gulped for a moment, then continued sobbing, though now he clutched at Lily and Sirius rather than thrashing in their arms.

            “We’re not dead, mate,” Sirius told him seriously a moment later.  “We’re still here.”

            “For how long?” James choked out, collapsing down onto the snow in exhaustion and pain rather than drunkenness now.  “For how long, really, Sirius?”

            “We’ll always be here for you, mate,” Sirius told him.  “I promise you that.”

            After several more minutes, James calmed enough that, with Lily and Sirius still under his arms to lead him in the right direction, he could make it back up to the castle.  By this point, Marissa was shivering furiously and had gone even paler though she was trying to hide it even as Peter and Remus helped her keep her feet under her.

            “You shouldn’t have come,” James told Marissa, looking worried and guilty as he regarded her.

            “I had to stop Lily from attacking the Hog’s Head,” Marissa told him.  “She was so furious at the amount of alcohol he’d sold you, how he’d let you endanger yourself.  So I went in after her.”

            “But haven’t you got a lifelong ban from the Hog’s Head?” Remus asked in confusion.

            “Exactly,” Marissa said.  “The bartender remembered me and bellowed at the help to remove us before Lily could even get a good hex going on him.  That way she stayed out of trouble.”

            “You don’t think I could have taken him?” Lily demanded.  “A bartender with poor judgment enough to do _this_ to James?”

            “While I don’t doubt you could have taken a bar owner who is in fact _Aberforth Dumbledore_ ,” Marissa told her, hiding her gasping breath from the everyone but Remus and Peter, “I don’t want you to get into trouble and make this mess worse.  Now, boys, which passage are we taking?”

            “We don’t have time or the strength to get all the way up to the castle,” Sirius said after casting a confirming look back at Remus.  “We’ll step into the Shack and light a fire and deal with all of this there.” 

-*-*-

            Remus understood, now, how James had felt.  Remus had organized a funeral, met with lawyers, sent Marissa’s last desperate message to the Potters then met with Lily to see if there was anything he could do to help.  He had been cleared by the Aurors.  From this point on, he was nothing but a liability who wanted nothing more than to run up the Castle and spill everything about Peter when it might rip away the Potters’ last chance to escape.  Whatever plan they had, he couldn’t afford to mess it up, and he couldn’t help.  No one would care anymore if he got rip roaring drunk, and there was nothing else for him to do.  His friends would not even show up to drag him home.

            “I remember the first time your lot strolled into my pub,” Madam Rosemerta told him as she obligingly topped off his glass.  “I remember the first time I spoke to Marissa.”

            “So do I,” Remus replied.  “She was perfect.”

            “She was barmy,” Madam Rosemerta laughed.  “Fearless and bold and inescapably kind.”

            “She was the first,” Remus said quietly.

            There was a long pause before Madam Rosemerta asked gently, “The first what?”

            “Everything.” 

-*-*-

            Even if he hadn’t fallen in love with her, even if they hadn’t become best friends, even if they hadn’t ever seen each other again, Remus Lupin would always remember the first time that he met Marissa Fletcher, because of the way that she had looked at him.

 

_In your eyes, I am human._   


 

            Remus Lupin remembered, vaguely, a time when that was nothing special.  He remembered much more clearly the moment when it had all come home to him that those times had expired.  It was when his family was asked to move away from the town in which he had started growing up, where he had made friends with the neighborhood children and shared a private tutor with three other magical children.

            Then, a few years later, his parents had sat him down and told him not to expect a Hogwarts letter.  When it came anyway, the looks they exchanged over his head (as if he couldn’t see them) and the conversations both with him and behind their door at night about how to tell the Headmaster to withdraw the offer, were even worse.

            When Albus Dumbledore’s twinkling blue eyes had settled on him, seeming to pierce right through to the rent soul he now shared with a monster, Remus Lupin had been certain that the man must not know that he was no longer human.  But he had, and he had treated Remus Lupin like any other student – any other student with a problem that could be managed.  His parents had been skeptical, worried for him, but Dumbledore had insisted that the choice belonged to Remus alone, and they hadn’t argued.  So Remus Lupin chose to go to the school of this man who looked at him like he was close enough to a human to be a true wizard rather than the parents who looked at him with fear and shame – shame he didn’t really know at that age was not of him but shame that they had not protected him.

            So Remus Lupin arrived on Platform Nine and Three Quarters as a regular first year, like a normal person for the first time since he had received the Bite.  He knew it was a lie from the way his parents fussed after him and looked as if they wanted to bring him home with them and away from this place that would offer him humanity then someday, inevitably, take it away.

            Remus Lupin looked away from them, and he saw her for the first time.  Other families held his interest briefly: a messy, black-haired boy being petted by his adoring parents, a greasy boy looking after his eagerly departing mother, two twin boys fighting over who would eat which lunch their mother had packed, and finally a blonde girl whirling her younger brother about and laughing delightedly.  Here his gaze fixed, at the look of delight as she regarded the small boy the way Remus’s parents had long since stopped looking at him.  Remus thought it was shame that stole the look from their eyes, but the maternal look of the young girl was the smile of a parent who had never made a truly terrible mistake and hurt their child.  The Lupins would never smile that smile again.

            Remus watched in fascination as the girl turned from her warm, even tearful, goodbye with her younger brother to a cold one with the man who seemed to be her father.  They shook hands rather than hugged, and she turned to go without asking for one.  Her brother leapt into her arms again, but she finally set him down and boarded the train, where her trunk had apparently already been stashed.  The whistle was blowing fairly urgently now.

            Pulling away from his parents, Remus hurried to yank his trunk into the train before it was too late.  Unfortunately, it peevishly decided to wedge itself between the two steps up into the train and would not come free however much he pulled at it.  Remus was about to go into full-fledged panic when the train gave its first jerk forward and he was still trying to force his trunk onto the train.  He looked up, but his parents had been drawn into a conversation with another couple and didn’t see his predicament.

            “Hurry!” a girl’s voice called from below, taking the handle on the bottom side of the truck and heaving it to the right then the left in an attempt to free it.  Remus pulled too and, after a moment, practically fell back as it toppled at last onto the train.  He immediately sprang up and reached out his hand to help haul his helper, now running alongside the train, up and safely onto it.

            She was panting slightly, but she smiled at him radiantly.  It was the same blonde girl whose goodbye to her brother had so fascinated him.  She was the first person that Remus Lupin had met since he was five years old who looked at him as if she had no doubt that he was human, that he was a person, that he was not dangerous.  Of course, it was because she had no idea what he was, but she was the first nonetheless.

            “Thanks,” he said nervously, suddenly acutely embarrassed about the situation.

            “Don’t mention it,” she replied with a warm smile, “but shouldn’t it be the boy who helps the girl get her trunk onto the train?”

            Remus smiled sheepishly at her before managing to return her gentle, friendly teasing.  “That is the traditional way,” he agreed.  “Remus Lupin,” he said, pointing at himself as if she wouldn’t know who he was talking about otherwise.

            “Marissa Fletcher,” she said as she smiled even more broadly at him.  “It’s been a pleasure breaking tradition with you.”  Her eyes twinkled in amusement.  There was a slight pause, then Marissa jerked her thumb down towards the end of the train as she said, almost nervously, “You know, I’ve got a compartment to myself just one car down, do you want to sit with me?”

            Remus Lupin looked taken aback, which left her a pause in which she awkwardly continued, “I mean, that is the traditional way, isn’t it?  Meet another new student, sit together on the train, end up lifelong friends?”

            “So, lifelong friends?” Remus offered, extending his hand as if to seal the deal and rather hoping that it would.

            Marissa laughed, delightedly, picking up the other end of his trunk and leading the way toward the compartment.  Remus awkwardly withdrew his hand, hoping that he hadn’t overreached fatally.  “Why don’t you think about it – I’ll give you the length of the train ride to decide whether or not I’m a psychopath before you agree to anything else.”

            “Does that happen to you often?”

            “More than you’d think.”

            “And here I am just letting you lead me into the slaughter.”  And, truth be told, Remus wouldn’t even really have minded.

            He certainly didn’t mind risking expulsion, or betraying the trust of the man who had let him into Hogwarts despite everything, when the fifth year prefect led her brother into their compartment.  Despite his cold threats to go immediately to the Headmaster upon reaching the school, Marissa, Remus and Peter Pettigrew, who had joined them in the compartment a few minutes after the train got underway, decided to sneak him past the prefect’s watchful gaze.  Peter provided robes which Remus hemmed clumsily so that it would not be quite so obvious that Mundungus probably could have gone swimming in them, however unusually short Peter Pettigrew was at eleven.  Once they arrived at Hogsmeade station, the two boys ran interference with the prefect while Marissa introduced her brother to Hagrid, figuring the best defense was a good offense.

            It had worked.  Remus Lupin would never forget the look on Horace Slughorn’s face when he called out the last name on the list and there was still an apparent first year standing in the line.  He would never forget the pure, clear sound of Marissa’s laugh as she doubled over next to him at the sight.

-*-*- 

            She was always crazy like that.  She was always fearless and absolutely barking mad.  She was always bold and brilliant.  She was no slow-burning candle or even a cheerful fire in the grate.  She was a blazing bonfire, a firecracker exploding fantastically to light up the darkest night – like Lily and James and Sirius.  It was so easy to forget, as you basked in their beauty and their glory, how quickly such things fade into ashes and darkness.  She of all the Gryffindor Six would have died, far too young, even if there was no Voldemort, no Lucius Malfoy, no Peter Pettigrew…no Remus Lupin.

            Perhaps it was God’s way of equalizing things.  Perhaps it was just cruel.  Perhaps it was the more romantic notion of even the earth being unable to hold her still for long.

            Perhaps the firewhiskey was beginning to get to him.  Good.

            “Sounds like love at first sight,” Madam Rosemerta told him.  “I always knew you two had something going on.”

            “I loved her even before I knew to call it that,” Remus said quietly.  “I thought, once, that if I had her, I would have everything I would ever need.”  He was silent for a very long moment before he took another swig of his drink.  “I wish I had been right.”

-*-*- 

            Marissa Fletcher dragged Lily Evans into her and Remus’s feud with James and Sirius.  Remus didn’t mind.  Making friends again was more intoxicating than any alcohol he would ever taste.  And Lily Evans…well, she was brilliant, bold and beautiful.  It was hard to miss Lily Evans.  She was intimidating to everyone but Marissa and Remus.  With them, she laughed at their jokes and masterminded their side of the Prank War.

            Lily Evans was also the first person to start asking awkward questions about his absences.  She made him afraid again, and he remembered that chill crawling down his spine when the fear he had almost learned to forget came back at one look from Lily Evans.  Lily Evans scared a lot of people.  She could terrify enemies, especially when they found themselves on the wrong end of her clever wand or trapped in one of her clever ambushes.  She could terrify her friends most of all: make them afraid of disappointing her.  And Remus was petrified of disappointing Lily, of her knowing that he was a monster, of losing her on his side.

            Especially when he had found her crying after a Defense class one day in third year – the class in which they had learned about werewolves.  “Lily?” Remus gasped, afraid of Crying Lily more than Lily-in-a-towering-temper or Set-on-revenge-Lily or even Suspicious/concerned-Lily-asking-where-he’d-been-last-night.

            Lily made a desperate attempt to pull herself together quickly.  “Remus,” she said, swiping at her eyes and sitting up straight, master only of her voice, which had assumed a commendably normal tone.  “How are you?”

            “Lily, what’s wrong?” Remus said because he had never been one to let her off of the hook.  She would find that increasingly annoying as the years went by, but Remus suspected that she was more upset when it started to disappear in later years after Hogwarts.  Remus would wonder if it was part of what made her suspicious of him: that he had changed so dramatically that he didn’t press her about why she was withdrawing from him.  He had never been too afraid of the answer to stop asking the question before.

            “Oh, I suppose it’s silly really,” Lily said, resigning herself to having this conversation when he sat down across from her in the empty classroom where she had hidden herself away.  “Sometimes I just miss my old life.  I used to like watching movies with magic in them when I was little, you know.  I watched a lot with my mother.  It was easier than trying to talk all the time.  I remember this one time we watched a movie about a werewolf – some old black and white film I can’t remember the name of – and it seemed like the only thing that the poor Bitten hero could do was nobly let himself be killed by the woman who loved him.  It was just such a – raw deal that I tried to find a movie with a better solution.  Hollywood didn’t have one.”

            Remus now officially wished that he could ooze down into the floor and disappear through it.  Or spontaneously combust and self-destruct.  Anything to be out of this conversation.  Was that his options in the Muggle world if he wanted to be a good man?  Was that what Lily would expect of him if she ever found out the truth?

            Unaware of the depth or source of his distress, Lily continued, “It’s the sort of story that’s only really bearable because it’s not true, because it’s all fiction and doesn’t happen to real people.  Then to find out that werewolves really do exist and real people have to deal with…have to find a way to live with it when the magical world doesn’t have any more solutions than Muggle fiction stories…”  Lily laughed a little at herself.  “I guess I just sometimes miss the simpler world where those things can’t happen to good people in real life.  There’s just got to be a better way, but the Ministry doesn’t seem to want to see it and I can’t.  Perhaps that’s why it made me think of my mother and watching that old movie with her.  I can’t ever seem to do anything about things that just…just shouldn’t be unfixable.”

            Remus couldn’t really recall what response he had made to all this.  If anything, that was the moment to tell her about his condition.  However, he was pretty sure that he didn’t.  He probably talked to her about her mother.

            Lily so rarely talked about her mother.  She didn’t hide her.  In fact, over Christmas holidays in first year she had asked them all over for a visit to the hospital.  She had explained that she and her sister always visited the children’s ward and brought them to meet the extended family she had adopted because she spent so much time in the hospital.  Then she had told them why, and brought them in to see her mother briefly.  It wasn’t a bad day, but it hadn’t been a good one either, so they hadn’t been able to stay long.  It was too long for most of them.

            They all had darkness in their lives, buried in their families: the Blacks’ obsession with the Dark Arts, Jerome Fletcher’s abuse, Peter’s parents constantly fighting and ignoring him in the process, Remus’s parents’ shame and Lily’s shattered mother.  They didn’t know James’s for quite awhile, but they finally saw the fear in his eyes whenever his parents stood next to theirs, looking so very old.  And the Potters were on the front lines of the conflict with Voldemort, taking a political stand from the very beginning.

            They should have known that the world did not intend to be kind to them.  Finding each other seemed to use up all of their good karma, perhaps for lifetimes to come.  Finding five people who looked at him like he was human, five extraordinary people who loved him and befriended him and helped him, was worth more karma than a werewolf had any right to have.

            They had been willing to be strong for each other and weak for each other.  They had been willing to be better people for each other and to make terrible mistakes for each other.  They had been willing to forgive each other and to plead for forgiveness from each other.

            Remus had forgiven Sirius for endangering his secret and his freedom, not to mention making him potentially the murderer of Severus Snape, Marissa Fletcher’s boyfriend at the time.  He had forgiven them within the week, from the moment that Severus Snape stood up to announce his secret to the Great Hall in retaliation for James forcing Marissa’s hand about the break-up.  The way that they had sprung into action, heedless of the teachers sitting right there and their probation.  They blasted right through those teachers to make Snape pay for hurting him.  He forgave them even before James ensured that Dumbledore would provide a school-wide Memory Charm to protect him.

            He forgave them because he needed them.  They made him whole.  They made him feel as if his soul were not divided into two parts: monster and mate, forever doing battle.  Remus was never sure which side was winning, which would win the final struggle, except when he was with them.

            Marissa most of all, but not her alone.  Not once he had found the Marauders and Lily Evans.

-*-*- 

            Remus had known that when he had agreed to put them at risk – no to sacrifice them – for Marissa.  Remus had known that it would break him, that when she died he would have no one.  He had known that it was the hardest thing that she could have possibly asked of him.

            He hadn’t admitted it.

            So perhaps she was right, they had stopped being able to talk to each other when he didn’t.  All too soon, their home had been filled with the things that they could not say. 

-*-*- 

            Marissa had been the one to suggest that they plunge into those shadows.  She went to Dumbledore, dragging him along, and convinced both men at once that she could be useful to the War effort even in her heavily diminished state.  Remus had agreed to amend his mission from public to Top Secret to grant her the necessary perceived neutrality.  Dumbledore had talked to her alone for almost an hour afterwards, and she had never been able to tell him what they had discussed.

            But she kept up a secret correspondence with the Headmaster that had little or nothing to do with the tidbits that Dobby and Kreacher leaked to her.  Remus was afraid to ask her for details, and not because he didn’t want to hear her say that she couldn’t tell him.  He liked not being sure, because then he could pretend that he truly believed the sacrifice was worth it.  Whatever her mission was, he had to believe that it was worth everything he cared about.

            Most of the time, they could both pretend it very well.  Only once had the façade broken down completely, but from that point on it had been nearly impossible to keep up.

            When Lily and James had made Sirius Harry’s guardian in their will, Marissa had finally been willing to admit how much it hurt her.  They had not even considered, she said in a tightly controlled voice, asking Harry’s godmother, who was already married – to another one of their friends! – and had proven that she knew how to raise a child.

            “Yes, but you’re ill, Riss,” Remus had said.  “They know it would be hard if not impossible for you to take charge of another life right now and-“

            “Stop it, Remus,” she had cried as if in pain.  “You know that’s not why they did it.”  She had let out a dry sob and clung to him.  “I’m so tired of shadow games,” she whispered dejectedly into his chest.  It was the first time she had ever said out loud that she was unhappy with the role in the War that she had chosen.  “I’m just so tired of them.  The only people that I talk to who say what they mean anymore are house elves – and that’s only because they can’t tell me anything worth lying about!”

            “Do you not even trust me anymore then?” Remus said, hoping that he had meant it as a gentle reminder that he was on her side rather than as an accusation.

            “Oh, Remus,” she had said quietly, “you know we don’t say what we mean anymore.”  She laughed hollowly, then raised her head from his chest and looked him in the eyes.  “We pretend I’m not dying.  We pretend our friends don’t suspect us.  We pretend that even if they do, it’s not endangering them.  We pretend it’s not almost akin to betraying them ourselves.  We pretend you don’t resent me for taking them away.  We even pretend that you don’t know that it’s my fault.  We pretend so hard we can barely speak at all through the lies.  We think the shadows are our only hope of holding on.  That’s how I know they’ve got us.  That’s how I know we’re losing this war.”

            “It’s not too late, Riss,” Remus had comforted her.  “It’s not too late.”

            She had turned her face away from him, because she was afraid that he had just spoken the biggest lie of all.  Remus was afraid that he hadn’t.  He was afraid that it wasn’t too late, but they would behave as if it was too late until it really was.

-*-*- 

            Too late.  Was there even such a thing except in people’s minds?  The funeral, that _damn empty church_ , had seemed like the textbook definition of too late.  Then Marissa had worked her postmortem miracle of getting James and Lily to both listen to her and believe, in time to save them after all…

            Perhaps there was no such thing as ‘too late.’  Not for the Marauders.

            Then the bubble of hope in his chest deflated.  Wasn’t it too late to save Marissa?  Too late for one of the organizations to whom he gave so much money to come through with a miracle cure?  Too late did exist.

-*-*- 

            When he woke up in the hospital wing the afternoon after the Willow Incident, it was to find Marissa Fletcher sitting in the chair by his bed, her hands clasped under her chin as she leaned forward and stared at or through him.

            She gave him a moment to orient himself before she spoke.  “I’m glad you’re all right,” she said simply.  “Whatever those boys pulled, I’m glad you didn’t get seriously hurt.”  She was just as painstakingly sincere as ever, but her emotions seemed locked down, under close guard and key.

            “Well, if you want me to leave,” she said uncertainly a moment later, starting to stand.

            “No,” Remus gasped before he could think.  She stopped and looked at him again.  “It’s all right.  You can stay…please stay.”  She smiled slightly and nodded, settling back down in her chair.

            “I don’t have anywhere better to be,” she told him.  “There’s going to be a lot of fall-out this time, isn’t there?”  Remus didn’t even have the strength to nod.  It made him sick to his stomach to think how much, based on what Sirius had told him in the Shack before helping to drag him up to the Hospital Wing where James and Snape already lay in adjoining beds.  “I’m here for you, Remus, always,” she told him, reaching out to take his hand in hers.

            It made it better.  She always had.

 -*-*- 

            But she never would again.

            Since he was eleven years old, he had always had Marissa Fletcher there, in one capacity or another, to help him get through it.  He had always done the same for her.  Now she was gone.  After all the reprieves, all the times he almost lost her and didn’t, from the first remission to the kidnapping, he should have been ready for the moment when she finally was gone for good.  How many times had he lost her?  How many times had she, somehow, found her way back to him?  How many times had they thought that their world was going to go back to being normal and happy for the rest of their days?  How many times had she convinced him of that despite his better judgment?

            But she never would again.

-*-*- 

            It was during Transfiguration class on a perfectly normal Tuesday that insanity appeared strike the seventh year Gryffindors.  It attacked the least likely candidate of the lot and sent the others on a dizzying whirlwind of aftershock – with the exception of the one who had known it was coming.  She might have been spared, but since she was the cause it was clear that she had already been long gone when it started.

            They were halfway through the lesson before anything proved amiss.  Then McGonagall got tired of the silences that had reigned in the revision- and relief-befuddled brains of her students in response to her general questions to the class.  “My word, you should all have known these answers in your fifth year!” she cried in mild indignation.  “I know you are all relieved about Miss Fletcher’s recovery, as am I, but that is no reason to completely disregard your studies! Mr. Lupin, kindly tell me where vanished objects go?”

            There was a decided hesitation on the bloke’s face, which looked rather as if it were contorting painfully.  “Come, come, lad, you did well enough on your O.W.L.!  Your N.E.W.T.s are fast approaching, and I will expect a similar performance out of each of you,” Professor McGonagall said sharply.  “Where do vanished objects go?” she repeated.  A pretty blonde girl turned around with a decided smirk on her face to watch him squirm.

            Remus Lupin winced, sighed, then _sang_ , “ _Somewhere over the rainbow…_ ”

            It was a quite good voice, actually.  Nothing to write home about but certainly nothing to be embarrassed of – under normal circumstances.  Judging by the reaction of the class, however, he might very well have emitted the mating call of the crumple-horned snorkack.  There was dead silence around the room.

            Every eye – even that of the near-giggling blonde – swiveled from a pained Remus Lupin to the professor to see her reaction.  Her lips were decidedly thinner, though she seemed momentarily lost for words.  “Would you care to elaborate?” she asked without widening her lips and barely parting them to let the words escape.

            “ _Way up high…there’s a land that I heard of once in a lullaby_ ,” Remus Lupin sang again.

            “Mr. Lupin, if you do not take this seriously you may find yourself a permanent resident of that land,” Professor McGonagall said with a dangerous flash in her eyes.  “I realize that you are all under a great deal of pressure, but I must insist that, as we are doing some of the most dangerous and complex magic taught at this school, you continue to treat my class with respect and decorum.  Now, can you give me a serious answer to my questions or do you want to be the first Gryffindor to ever be removed from my class this late in the school year?”

            “ _Can’t help myself_ ,” Remus sang miserably.  “ _I want you and no one else, can’t help myself._ ”

            “I see,” Professor McGonagall said seriously, regarding him shrewdly.  “Mr. Lupin are you capable of giving me a spoken answer?” she asked, arching her left eyebrow at him.

            Shrugging helplessly but with slight relief that she seemed to be catching on, and sang in response, “ _How can I keep from singing?_ ”

            “I see,” McGonagall said again, just as severely.  “And how, Mr. Lupin, did you come to be in this state?”  She apparently wasn’t going to be kind about all of this, but she at least hadn’t kicked him out of class yet.

            “ _I fought the law and the law won_ ,” Remus sang in response.  He regarded McGonagall warily for her reaction.  It could have been his desperate imagination, but he thought he saw a flicker of amusement pass over her face.

            “And how long is this state likely to persist, Mr. Lupin?” McGonagall asked quietly.

            “ _We’re gonna rock around the clock tonight_ ,” Remus sang, actually daring to get into the song now.  “ _We’re gonna rock, rock, rock til broad daylight.  We’re gonna rock, gonna rock it around the clock tonight._ ”

            “Mr. Lupin!” McGonagall cut off his song.

            “ _Tomorrow, tomorrow, I love ya, tomorrow,_ ” Remus sang her his much more tame answer, looking abashed and embarrassed again.

            “You wouldn’t have anything to add, Miss Fletcher?” McGonagall turned on Marissa whose face was contorting grotesquely in her struggle not to laugh.

            “Why you would think that, Professor?” Marissa barely managed to squeak out, shaking slightly from the effort.

            “Where do vanished objects go, Miss Fletcher?” McGonagall asked severely, though none of the seventh years were fooled.  They knew that they had just been given a major reprieve, probably because McGonagall was extremely relieved about Marissa’s recovery as well.  She did not call on Remus Lupin for the rest of the review session but took no pity on the rest of them.

            The moment that they stepped out of class, the mastermind of the mayhem burst into almost hysterical laughter.  “I cannot _believe_ it!” she cackled, grabbing onto Remus’s shoulder to support herself as she laughed wildly.  “I cannot believe she let you get away with it.”

            “Just what did you do to him?” Sirius asked as he regarded both of them.

            “Let’s just say he made a rather rash promise when I was recovering in the Hospital Wing about what he would do when I went into remission,” Marissa gasped through her laughter.

            “ _Your cheatin’ heart…_ ” Remus chimed in promptly.

            “I didn’t cheat!” Marissa protested indignantly.  “How dare you say I cheated!”

            “ _Oh baby, you done me wrong,_ ” Remus sang, shaking his head at her.

            “I did nothing wrong!” Marissa shouted in protest.  “Why you little – liar!”

            “ _You’re so vain, you probably think this song is about you, don’t you?_ ” Remus sang in response.  Marissa made a loud noise of frustration, incapable of coming up with a response.

            “Is he actually winning an argument he can only have through song lyrics?” Lily had asked, tucking herself under James’s arm.  “That’s impressive actually.”

            “ _Can’t touch this_ ,” Remus sang, now adding a kind of victory dance to it.  “ _Duh, nuh nuh nuh, can’t touch this._ ”

            “Why you!” Marissa cried, starting to launch herself at Remus.

            Lily caught her and started to drag her down the corridor.  “C’mon, Riss, we have Ancient Runes in just a few minutes.”

            “I did not lose a fight with the Musicman!” Marissa shouted, though she allowed Lily to push her down the corridor.

            “ _We are the champions_ ,” Remus sang again.  All of the boys threw their arms around each other and swayed back and forth with him, humming along.  “ _We are the champions, my friends…no time for losers ‘cause we are the champions…_ ”

            Marissa gave a strangled cry of frustration and tried to launch herself back at him just as Lily forced her around the corner.

            “How did you do that?” James asked in mild appreciation, turning to Remus.

            Remus smiled warmly, amused that James, who hardly ever won an argument with Lily, sounded so distinctly jealous. “ _Oh, oh it’s magic, you know_ ,” he sang softly under his breath.

            Sirius snorted.  Peter sniggered appreciatively.  James grinned wickedly and opened up with a loud, pleasant baritone, “ _Never believe it’s not so, it’s magic…you know…_ ”  Just as all the Marauders were about to go caroling down the corridor in the direction of the Muggle Studies classroom, Marissa came running up and tapped Remus on the shoulder.

            When he turned around, she kissed him on the lips for a long moment.  “Sorry, I forgot to do that,” she smiled at him, both of the members of the brand new couple enjoying the shocked looks that their friends exchanged.  “You might want to consider how many arguments you actually want to win for the future if it makes me forget to kiss you goodbye,” she said impishly.  Then she gave him another quick peck.  “So what are you doing later?” she asked flirtatiously.

            “ _I go out walking, after midnight_ ,” he sang with a large smirk on his face.  He grabbed her hand, put his other against her back and began to lead her through a few halting dance steps as he sang, “ _Just the way we used to do.  I go out walking, after midnight, searching for you…_ ”  Marissa laughed as he spun her out.

            “It’s a date then,” she said as she hurried after a giggling Lily who was waiting for her at the end of the corridor.

            Once the girls were again out of sight, the boys fell to congratulating Remus in earnest.

-*-*-

 

            “ _Only you can make the world seem bright,_ ” Remus sang morosely.  “ _Only you can make the darkness bright…_ ”  He chuckled darkly and drank the last of his glass.

            “She’s gone, Rosie,” Remus said quietly when Madam Rosemerta passed his station at the bar again.  “The only one who made losing the rest of them bearable.  I was so close to losing her so many times…”

            “You lot were always there for each other,” Madam Rosemerta said quietly as he refilled his glass, looking slightly concerned about doing so.  “No matter what, even when Marissa ran around with that greasy Snape kid you all hated.  Even when Lily was furious with James and Sirius for two years she was still there when they needed her.  You really think they won’t even…the way you lot always were with each other, blind to all faults, unconditional…you’ve really given up on them so completely?”

            “Yes,” Remus replied simply.  “That was longer ago then just years, Rosie.”

            “Remus,” Madam Rosemerta started to cajole him, “Don’t you think-“

            “They skipped her funeral, Rosie,” he cut her off.  “They wouldn’t see her before she died.  She still put herself on the line for them, but they wouldn’t for her.  And I don’t know if I would put myself on the line for them anymore.”

            “Yes, you would,” she told him seriously.

            “I’d like to think that,” was all that Remus could reply.

            Madam Rosemerta was quiet for a long moment.  “I am so sorry that the War got in the way of what the six of you had.  It’s the kind of thing that doesn’t come around even once in every lifetime.”

            “Yet surprisingly fragile,” Remus told her.

            So Remus Lupin ordered five shot glasses and filled each one with some of Madam Rosemerta’s specialty red currant rum, as he was getting distinctly tired of firewhiskey. He lifted one to each of the Gryffindor Six that he had lost, that had faded away from him.  He drank to the beautiful illusion that they had enjoyed at Hogwarts – the mirage that had not stood up to the harsh reality of the War in the real world outside of the enchanted Castle, the heartbreaking dream that had vanished in the first rays of the morning light.

            To James, as he was when he told Remus that it was cool that he was a werewolf, when he had been the first to manage a transformation into a stag, when he had turned to Remus in barely suppressed panic just before his first prefect meeting as Head Boy, when he was the messy-haired boy who had seen through nearly every trick Remus had come up with in the Prank War because he insisted that nothing was ever what it seemed.  Before he was the fearful family man who did not dare take risks, whose ego had been curtailed by fear so much that he did not trust anything but the plainest sense and logic any more and was too afraid to listen to his once prized instincts.  Before James had followed the trail of evidence into disbelief and distrust and turned his back on his friend as a safety precaution.  When he had been the reckless, dashing teenage boy too clever and lucky for his own good, and before he was the cautious adult too afraid to just believe in Remus and Marissa blindly or even come to see him when he learned that he had been wrong.  


-*-*-

            “Really!  You’ll be fine!” Marissa insisted to Lily.  “Really, these meetings are _not_ a big deal.  I must have given you the dull play by play of half a dozen of these things over the past two years!  You fell asleep in the middle every time –“

            “Exactly!  I have no idea how they end-“

            “Quickly, if they’re any good,” Remus said, dragging an equally nervous James up to the Prefect Meeting Room behind Lily and Marissa.  “Really, you guys will be great.  There’s nothing to worry about.  You’ve been over everything with McGonagall anyway, right?”

            “Yeah, I suppose.”

            “Yes, yes, I know, but…”

            “No ‘but’s!” Marissa chirped.  “Now get in there!” She gave Lily a push into the room and Remus gave James a similar one to follow after her.  

            Then the two seventh year Gryffindor prefects, who had been passed over for Headship themselves, turned to each other.  “So,” Marissa had said.  “How big a disaster do you think it will be?”

            “Below Voldemort attacking the school but just above Sirius deciding to re-introduce Beirut at Quidditch celebration parties,” Remus mused with a growing smirk.

            “Well, we don’t want to miss a minute of that!” Marissa said, grabbing his hand to pull him into the room.

            “Prefect Fletcher!  Prefect Lupin!  You are both late!” Lily barked in greeting.

            “What are you on about?” Marissa asked, surprised.

            “You have entered after the Heads, therefore you are late, and if you speak to my partner in that tone again, Prefect, you will be on patrol duty for a month!” James barked in the same drill sergeant imitation as Lily.

            Remus had just laughed.  “Oh, I think they’ll be fine,” he chortled.  “But I want to upgrade my assessment of how disastrously this meeting will turn out.”

            “To just above Voldemort attacking but still below Filch deciding to give you a striptease fan dance during a detention?” Marissa offered.

            “Sounds about right.” 

-*-*-

            Remus down the shot, then reached for the one to raise to Sirius.  He drank to Sirius as he had been when he had pretended that he was okay with Remus being a werewolf until it was true; when he was the loudest in protest of Marissa’s relationship with Snape until Remus began to suspect he had romantic intentions toward her; when he and James were chatting up Rosemerta and securing mulled mead for their amateur flirting; when he was whizzing up and down the street in his brand new motorcycle and plotting how to make it fly.  Before he had started looking dark and suspicious when Marissa went to tea at the Malfoy Manor.  Before he had started excluding them, not talking freely around them.  Before he had become the defiantly non-Black who turned his back so determinedly on the Old Families and all that they stood for that he could not trust anyone who looked back at them, for whatever reason.

-*-*- 

            “Sorry ‘bout all that back there, Moony,” Sirius had said when they were in their dorm room alone on the night of Lily’s suggestion that Marissa and Sirius date and their dramatic rejection on the principle of overly similar personalities.  “Don’t know what Lily’s smoking, but I just thought I’d make a joke of it.”

            “Hey, I suppose it was funny,” Remus shrugged.

            “You didn’t laugh,” Sirius pointed out.

            Of course he hadn’t.  Remus Lupin had known for a few years now how he felt about Marissa Fletcher.  Even the supposedly humorous idea of her being perfect for someone else…and there had certainly been a lot of reasons…

            “Why don’t you just ask her out already?” Sirius demanded.  “Seriously!  Before she and Snape decide third time’s a charm.”

            Of course he hadn’t laughed, again.

            “Geez!  You really need to lighten up!” Sirius had slapped him on the back.  “My goodness, you need some more mayhem in your life.  What happened to that sense of humor of yours?”

            “Not now, Sirius,” was all that Remus could manage.  He dived behind his book again, hoping that Sirius would go away.

            Of course he didn’t.  Instead, Sirius snatched his book away and tossed it out the window.  Sirius, in fact, tossed just about everything of Remus’s that he could reach out of the window faster than Remus could summon it back for a good several minutes – laughing like a madman the entire time – until Peter trundled up the stairs to see what all the noise was about and tell them that people in the Common Room were complaining.

            Of course, that only meant that Sirius moved his mission into the Common Room itself and made Remus chase him all around the entire Tower trying to save his things.  After ten minutes of this, both boys were laughing too hard to put up much of a fight any longer.

-*-*-

            Then to Lily, when she was the stand up comedian of the children’s cancer ward; when she was the evil mastermind of their half of the Prank War; when she was reaching out to James and Sirius in their times of trouble even while she pretended to hate them on normal days; when she leapt to her feet to defend Snape because Marissa writhed in pain next to her; when she helped Marissa come up with a new wild hairstyle every day for her magical wig; when she and James had written whole comedy acts to entertain them in the hospital wing during Marissa’s treatments and recovery; when she had stood radiant beside James at her wedding.  Before she had become the frightened as well as frightening warrioress who had had too many people seem to stop loving her to put her faith in almost anyone.  Before she had become the calmly resolute, sorrowful woman standing in the graveyard today, apologetic but powerless to correct her mistakes.  Before she had lost faith in her best friend and her husband.  When she had been larger than life, and before she had looked so very small. 

-*-*- 

            Remus bolted upright in bed at the explosion of sound on the night before the beginning of the Christmas holidays.  He drew the curtains to see three others face looking just as shocked by the music streaming up through the tower as he felt.

            “Is that the Nutcracker Suite?” James asked sleepily.  It was, but it wasn’t.

            “Has it always sounded so…militant?” Sirius asked a moment later.

            Then there was a rap on the door.  Peter half moved to open it, but the three boys chorused, “Don’t!”  They had not thought that the sounds of “Dance of the Sugarplum Fairies” could have sounded ominous, but there was no doubt that it did now.

            A series of three raps hit across the door when there was no answer.  After another moment, ten small thuds occurred in rapid succession.  

            There was a tense, quiet moment, then James hollered, “Block the door!” and all four boys launched themselves against the door just as what could have been hundreds of medium-sized rocks landed against the door, trying to force it open.  They held it back for two more ever increasing blasts, then the door came shooting free, knocking them aside, and sugarplum fairies – of all things – burst into their room.

            The fairies were not the devilish cornish pixies or anything else that belonged in their Defense Against the Dark Arts class.  Instead, they were like miniature little girls in white nightgowns with gossamer wings of ten thousand different colors that trailed a bright dust behind them as they capered and danced happily around the room, landing on each of the boys’ heads before flying off again with high, girlish giggles.

            A different kind of laughter was coming from the common room.  It was louder, lower and constant.  The boys dared to look down the spiral staircase, where they could just make out a view of the Common Room in which Lily Evans and Marissa Fletcher were dancing about amidst a swarm of the fairies and occasionally shooting more out of their wands and urging them up the staircases.

            By the time the boys descended the stairs, they had switched songs to Carol of the Bells and were singing loudly (though not badly) along with the sweet voices of the fairies, who were providing the sounds of bells as the girls danced about carelessly and happily.  “Happy Christmas!” they chorused at the stunned sixth year boys, heedless of their shock or displeasure.  The girls had been shocked in their turn a year and a half later to learn that the boys hadn’t known that they were ridiculously drunk.

            “Have you both gone mad?” Sirius practically choked.

            “Oh!” Lily cried, “Of course!  I can’t believe we forgot!”  And with that, she transfigured the closest sofa into a hippopotamus.  The hippo was wearing a tutu and went dancing along with sugarplum fairies quiet happily.  “Thanks for the pointers, Potter!”

            “I cannot believe I fell for her ‘tutoring’ nonsense,” James muttered.

            “I can’t believe it either,” Lily cried then laughed.  Then she and Marissa looped their arms together and returned to dancing and singing along with their creations.

-*-*-

            And even for Peter, when he was talking their way out of trouble; when he was cheering for James and his silly little snitch; when he had suggested that they become Animagi; when he had done whatever they needed heedless of the personal cost to himself; when he was naming all of their exploits; when he was steadily toiling on the potion-ink that would allow them to create the great Marauders Map and braving Lily’s wrath and suspicion to get her help; when he was trying to distract Sirius from the chess game to give Remus an advantage; when he was diving in front of an Unforgivable to save Lily.  Before he had given up on their friendship and fled for the protection of Voldemort’s forces.  Before he had started turning the others against Remus and Marissa to save his own skin.  Before he had turned on them, betrayed them, before he had let Remus out of the small shack and released a werewolf upon his old friend.

-*-*-

             “We need a drinking game,” Peter had declared as they all sat around on the lawn outside of the Shrieking Shack after graduation, reminiscing and laughing as they drank the supplies that James had purchased in the Three Broomsticks after Remus had been kicked out for fighting with Snape.

            “Like, anytime someone says the word ‘prank,’ we all have to do a shot?” Marissa suggested.  “That could liven up the conversation.”

            “Or saying tongue-twisters and drinking after every mistake?” Lily said, then giggled.

            The boys exchanged looks.  Obviously, the girls were rookies in the world of drinking games.

            “I’ve got the Exploding Snap cards,” Peter said, pulling a deck out of his robes.  “I brought them along for just this occasion.”

            “What, do we build a house and drink when it explodes?” Lily asked in confusion.

            “No, we’re playing McGonagall,” Peter corrected.  He smirked as he explained, “That’s what we decided to call the game.  Basically, whoever the tower explodes on gets to make up a rule for the next run like, oh, I don’t know, whenever you finish a row you have to shoot off fireworks or declare your passionate love for something.  You don’t tell anyone your rule, you just tell them when to drink if they’ve broken a rule, and the rules keep building as you play.”

            “Peter adapted it,” Remus explained to the girls.

            “It’s fun,” James added.  “We play it all the time…er, I mean…”

            “Oh please, it’s not like I don’t know you drink, Potter,” Lily laughed at him.  “My first rule will probably be that you can’t censor yourself around me during the game.”

            “Wait your turn to be McGonagall, Lils,” Peter said pointedly, placing two cards together to start the game.

            “How come you always get to start as McGonagall, Peter?” Sirius complained loudly.

            “Because, dear Padfoot, I introduced you to the game, and they’re my cards,” Peter replied.  “And by the way, you already have to do a shot.”

            “Always within the first ten seconds of the game!” James roared in laughter.

            “I think he cheats,” Sirius grumbled, but downed a shot of firewhisky after shooting a dirty look at Peter.

-*-*-

             There was only one left.  Whether Remus meant to drink it for himself or for Marissa, he did not know.  Madam Rosemerta put a hand over his and pulled the glass gently from his grasp when he reached for the final shot.  She met his red-rimmed eyes and told him softly, “Remus, why don’t you stay in one of our rooms for the night?”

            “I’m a married man, Rosie,” he said in a deadened, hollow voice that barely sounded like it belonged to the same person as the awkwardly flirting boy she had known at Hogwarts.  “I can’t sleep with you.  I need to go home.”  Then he laughed.  “But I have no idea where that is!”

            “Why don’t you come upstairs, Remus?  I’ll give you a room for the night.  No charge.  Come on now then,” and she half-led and half-carried him up to one of the guest rooms of the pub and installed him in the tiny broom cupboard with a bed that the Three Broomsticks had adapted into a guest room when people began losing their homes to Death Eater attacks.  Remus collapsed onto the bed and swallowed one last gulp of liquid, a potion for dreamless sleep that Rosemerta thoughtfully pushed into his hands.

            That was where Remus Lupin was when Lily and James Potter died.

-*-*-

             Rosemerta shook him awake in darkness, though it was well past midday.  “Remus!  Remus, you’ve got to wake up!  The rumors…the rumors that are flying around!”

            And what rumors they were.  Rosemerta told him of what was being said about the Potters, about Harry, about Voldemort.  She told him who had confirmed that their house in Godric’s Hollow had been destroyed, who had seen Hagrid with the baby flying on a motorcycle in the clouds across several counties, driving like it was trying to lose invisible tails.  She told him how Voldemort had gone, those who had heard from Dumbledore himself…

            And she seemed to want him to confirm it all.  It seemed that Madam Rosemerta would only believe it once she had the confirmation of a Marauder.  She expected him to have some psychic connection that would have informed him of all this as it happened.  Perhaps she would have been right once.  Perhaps once he would have known instantly if any of the Gryffindor Six had come to harm.

            Perhaps that was all tosh.  It sounded like the kind of rubbish they had always deluded themselves with.  Like the fairy tale that nothing could ever break their friendship.  Absolute tosh.

            Remus stood and walked out of the room, blinking furiously in the light and to keep back tears that he suddenly noticed were rolling down his cheeks, which was apparently enough for Rosemerta.  He stumbled down the stairs into the pub, where every resident of Hogsmeade seemed to be celebrating in delight: hugging and kissing and shooting up sparks and ordering rounds for the house.  Those who Remus Lupin passed stopped for a long moment, whispered after him, but quickly returned to celebrating their freedom.

            Freedom that had come to late for the Gryffindor Six, apparently. 

            He stumbled up the road to Hogwarts not because he was still drunk or because he was hung-over, though both might well have been true.  He stumbled because he did not trust the ground under him to remain firm, not in a world where Lily and James died despite knowing their danger.  What could be trusted in a world where it hadn’t mattered in the end that the Lupins and the Potters had managed to repair their shattered friendship and trust?  Where that hadn’t turned the tide?

            That had been the foundation of his suffering, the foundation of his tragedy.  It had held him steady even when he lost the love of his life, sacrificed his wife to his monstrosity: the thought that their renewed friendship could save the Potters.

            It hadn’t even mattered that Marissa’s last message had repaired the damaged friendships.  It hadn’t mattered in the end.

            Remus Lupin burst through the front doors of Hogwarts and saw that pandemonium had broken lose throughout the school.  He saw the students spilling out into the Entrance Hall from the Great Hall, where Albus Dumbledore stood at the Head Table, having apparently just finished an announcement to the school at large.  So it was true.

            Remus stood framed in the doors to the school as students embraced and cried, danced on tables, raced up to the owlery to share joy or give warning to Death Eater relatives, shot sparks into the air, and collapsed into silence in shock and relief.  The name of Harry Potter ran in whispers and shouts all along the Hall, echoing throughout the halls of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry for the first, though not nearly for the last, time.

            Remus simply stared for time unending, then he saw Albus Dumbledore coming toward him.  “Mr. Lupin,” he said gravely.  He did not go on.  Remus wandered what the old Headmaster would have managed to say if he had just waited for Dumbledore to come up with something to say.  Maybe the two men would have stood there forever.

            “Where’s Mundungus?” Remus croaked, shocked by how hoarse and choked his voice sounded.  He probably looked like a thing of nightmares.  He probably resembled, he realized with an unpleasant shock, Jerome Fletcher.  He even fit into the same profile: the once devoted father who fell apart at the seams and turned dangerous after the loss of his wife.  So Remus understood when Marissa’s brother wouldn’t see him.

            She must have known.  Remus and Mundungus would both be barely half a man when she was gone.  That was why she tried so hard to pull away from Gus, why she reacted so horribly when she thought he dropped out of school for her.  That was why she held Remus at arm’s length for so long, having known how they both felt for years.  She wanted them to try to grow alone as much as possible.  And she had let them feed on her strength and her wholeness, on her certainty and solidness, so that they would grow quickly.  But they were still each only half a man.  She had not had time, so she left them each other.

            They should have completed each other.  They should have leaned on each other as a family until they were whole enough to stand on their own.  She had meant them to have each other when she was gone, to lean on each other and help each other grow.

            She was always naïve, even foolish.  It was so easy to forget, because she could be so wise and because she was so barmy, that she really was an idiot about so many things.  They were all idiots in their different ways.  They were so brilliant, something had to compensate for it.  It was so easy to forget that.

            Even after Sprout then Dumbledore himself spoke to Mundungus Fletcher on behalf of his brother-in-law, he would not see Remus Lupin.  Both men, in the despair of their grief, reached out a desperate hand for the other, but both were denied because it happened at different moments.  Remus was not there to break the news to Mundungus because he had killed the woman that had made them both feel whole.  Mundungus would not see Remus because he could not trust the man who looked so like the father he had rightly feared, especially not without Marissa to protect him as she always had. 

            It was unfortunate, because they could have saved each other many hard years.  They could have kept each other from losing so much of themselves.

            But Remus failed Mundungus.  He killed Marissa Fletcher, and he became her father.  It was only for one night, but Mundungus could not believe that, not with the other crimes in Remus’s dossier.  Without Marissa, those two boys had always had horrible timing – they had always been and would always be half a man.

 

_In your eyes, I wanted to see forgiveness.  I wanted to look you in the eyes and see that I was not alone and that you forgave all of my mistakes.  But you refused to see me, and you were the only one left to give it, so I had to live without it._

 

            Remus said he would wait, but in truth he could simply go no further.  Besides, Dumbledore had gone.  He had to tell him.  He had to tell him that Peter was the betrayer, that Peter had let him out of the broomshed to attack his wife, that Peter had been the one to send the Dark Mark into the sky above the Fletcher mansion.  Remus had to tell Dumbledore that Sirius Black should have been the one to be given custody of Harry Potter, as Lily and James stipulated in their will.

            Late in the evening, Professor McGonagall found him sitting on the cold stone floor of the Entrance Hall and told him where Dumbledore had taken Harry Potter.  She told him of her concerns that Petunia would not take the boy, that she and her horrible husband would reject the Boy Who Lived in their hatred of anything abnormal and of everything magical.

            He thought this an even better reason for Dumbledore to give the boy to Sirius.  He insisted on seeing the Headmaster and told him so.

            “Sirius Black was the Potters’ Secret Keeper,” Albus Dumbledore said sadly.  “They informed me of this themselves, and he has relayed messages from them.  Not an hour before they were destroyed, Sirius Black tore out of my office after I foolishly told him of your wife’s secret.  He knew that the time had come to act.”

            “Marissa found out that Peter was the one who betrayed them,” Remus insisted.  “She sent them a book with a message that convinced them!  I know, Lily met with me!  She told me they were taking steps to protect themselves from Peter –“

            “They seem to have chosen the wrong man twice, then,” Dumbledore said sadly.

            “Professor, listen,” Remus said desperately.  “The night that Marissa died, she invited Peter Pettigrew over.  She wanted to talk to him, try to convince him to come back to our side.  It was the kind of stupid thing she could always convince me to let her do – and it got her killed!  He killed her!  You know the latch was tampered with!  HE KILLED HER AND YOU WANT TO TELL ME HE’S NOT THE SPY?”

            “She invited Mr. Pettigrew over, you say,” Dumbledore said mildly in response to Remus’s roaring finish.  “She also called Mr. Black on the shard of the two-way mirror that was taken into evidence by the Ministry.”

            Remus sat down heavily.  There had to be some way to prove it.  There had to be some way to make him see the truth, despite everything.  “Lord Voldemort killed the Potters personally.  Only by breaking their Secret Keeper could he have accomplished this feat,” Dumbledore told him firmly but not unkindly.

            “How can you send Harry to Petunia?  You know what she’s become,” Remus said quietly.

            So Albus Dumbledore explained the blood protection inherent in Lily Potter’s sacrifice and the protection charm that would be sealed when Petunia Dursley accepted the boy into her home.  It was far better than a ragged werewolf who had already failed one almost-son could offer or even that a cleared Sirius Black could have promised.

            Defeated on two fronts, resigned only to one of these defeats, Remus Lupin left Albus Dumbledore’s office to seek out Professor McGonagall.  They went together to ensure that Petunia Dursley sealed the charm to protect Harry Potter.

            That was where Remus Lupin was when Peter Pettigrew seemed to die revenging Lily and James, and Sirius Black seemed to be his murderer.

-*-*-

             When Remus Lupin delivered Petunia’s ultimatum, Dumbledore told him the sad truth and the even more tragic lie.

            So the last minute mending of all that lay between the Lupins and Potters had not been what was needed to save the Potters.  It was what fate needed to destroy them.  The power of the Gryffindor Six had not waned but been twisted to fit dark purposes.

            Remus felt like a petulant child to be bitter that the War that had plagued the wizarding world for most of his life had not required any more deaths than those who were dearest to him.  The Gryffindor Six were the only ones who had to be destroyed in order to take Voldemort with them.

            How cruelly destiny had used the friendships, the sparklingly pure friendships of Hogwarts days, to kill, maim and obliterate them.  Yes, love was the most powerful force in the world.  Dumbledore was right about that.  Remus wondered, however, if the Headmaster knew how it could be twisted to do evil work as well.  Then again, perhaps Dumbledore did not see their pain and suffering and death as evil works, not if it brought about peace.  Then it was only tragic love that saved the world from the Dark Lord Voldemort.

            Love could be the weapon of an evil genius.  Love could be used to destroy good things, and not just for benevolent ends.  That was the only mercy in Lord Voldemort’s rise to power.  He did not know how to manipulate love for his own purposes.  It was a very meager advantage when Destiny used it like a scalpel.

            With these thoughts in his head, Remus Lupin stumbled once again into the Three Broomsticks.  The pub went momentarily quiet at the sight of him.  He grabbed a tankard of mulled mead in the silence and lifted it with all eyes upon him.  “To Harry Potter,” he choked.  “The boy who lived.”

            Remus Lupin clung to that with savage ferocity.  He needed Harry Potter.  He needed him to be safe.  He needed him to be alive.  Otherwise, none of it was worth it.  Otherwise, he would turn back time and reverse the last week even if the War continued for the next hundred years.  This world was only bearable if Harry Potter was alive and well within it.  That was the only thing that made the destruction of the Gryffindor Six mean anything.  Otherwise there was no point in them being so bright and so brilliant and shining so fearlessly at Hogwarts or beyond it.  Only providing the generation that could destroy their enemy forever, only protecting the savior of the wizarding world itself – and more importantly, the child of Lily Evans and James Potter – was worth the sacrifices they had so willingly, so foolishly, made.

            “To Harry Potter,” the entire town of Hogsmeade echoed in one voice, in a quiet whisper.

            Then Remus drank the tankard in one long pull.  He would get drunk, and he would stay so for three weeks.

            But Remus had always exerted superhuman self-control over his mind and body outside of the monthly transformations.  His need for such discipline and his steadfast cultivation of it were probably due to how much he loathed the loss of his control to the full moon and the little piece of Fenrir Greyback’s soul that had infected him with the scourge of his life.  So when he allowed himself three weeks to drink, he knew he would have no more.   Then he would have a week to find a new place for his November transformation.

            Three weeks to the day from Halloween, Remus Lupin would stop.  He would touch nothing stronger than butterbeer for many years.

            But for now, he would drink.  He would drink to keep from closing his eyes despite his desperate need for sleep.  He would drink because these people looked at him strangely, like a lone mourner at a wedding or a man on the verge of madness.

            They had no idea.  They had no idea what he saw behind his closed eyelids, what he would always see.

-*-*-

             He is afraid to open his eyes because he smells blood, and the floor under him is not the cold, uneven stone of the safely secured shack but the plush carpet found inside the house.  He is afraid to open his eyes because a liquid he strongly suspects is blood is caking his face and, running down from his lips, and a lump he strongly suspects is human flesh is still lodged behind his teeth.  He is afraid to open his eyes because it is light pressing against them that has awakened him and not the soft, gentle call of his wife.  He is afraid to open his eyes because he knows that he has never had a dream on the night of the full moon and has not started now.  He is afraid to open his eyes because he already knows that he killed her.

            Finally, revulsion at the taste of her flesh in his mouth overcomes these fears and he sits up to spit it from him with a violent shudder.  Now he is trapped.  Now he has no choice but to look at the scene before him.

            Blood is not only dripping from his mouth.  It is everywhere.  The machines that kept Marissa Lupin alive are in pieces on the floor.  The sheets and blankets on the bed are in tattered shreds, falling around a still figure whose right arm is limp, pulled from the shoulder socket, and whose left arm is missing entirely – eventually located in the far corner of the room.  Huge chunks have been torn out of her legs, and her shattered kneecaps allow them to swing at sickening angles.  Teeth marks litter her torso as well as her severed limbs, sometimes tearing away pieces of her flesh and sometimes simply chewing on her bones, breasts, and exposed intestines.

            Bloody flesh and soaked red linens litter the entire room.  Pieces of her are everywhere.  Her wig lies several feet away, but half of the hair has fallen around the room, clinging to the blood and blowing in the gentle breeze from the open window.

            Her neck is so bitten and torn that she is now as nearly headless as Sir Nicholas de Mimsy-Porpington.  Her face is covered in dried blood, but it bears no wound.  Remus Lupin crumbles in despair, placing his forehead against hers, afraid to touch her broken body.  He closes his eyes again, but his nose still smells the sharp, acrid smell of blood and guts.  He can still taste her blood and skin in his mouth.  His ears still do not hear her voice.

            And now this is what his eyes will see whenever they close.

            That is where Remus Lupin was when his wife died.  He was killing her.

-*-*-

             Remus Lupin locked eyes briefly with Madam Rosemerta and saw it as she looked at him.  It was so ridiculous that he laughed aloud.  She looked on him with pity but relief, as if he were the lucky one.

 

_In your eyes, I am the survivor._

 

            Technically, he supposed that he was.  Remus Lupin was the member of the Gryffindor Six, of the Marauders, still standing, still alive, still free.

            Madam Rosemerta would not look relieved if she knew the cost of surviving this War.

            There were many things that Remus Lupin never expected to be.  Before he was five years old, he never would have dreamed that he would spend the rest of his life as a werewolf.  Before his second year, he never would have thought he could be a Marauder, a trusted friend despite his lycanthropy.  Before he was nineteen, he never would have believed he would be Marissa Fletcher’s husband.  He never would have expected to be a suspected traitor or a wife-killer or the failed father of a pseudo-son who would not see him.

            Remus almost should have been used to it by now.  His life never turned out the way that he expected.  There had been a time it soared above his wildest dreams, and now it was exceeding his worst nightmares.

            Of all the Gryffindor Six, how amazing that he was the one left over, the one who had made it through to see the days of peace purchased with the blood of the others and powered by the breaking of the bonds that once held them together.  How incredible that he would live to see what their sacrifice had won, he who of all of them had been most desperate to know and most afraid of the knowledge of whether or not it was worth what it cost them.  How unbelievable that he would be the one to linger in the world of shadows in which they had lost sight of each other.

            But he was not the survivor.

 

-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-

Remus’s Epilogue

-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-

 

            Nymphadora Tonks smiled at him as if they were old friends after being introduced at her first Order of the Pheonix meeting.  It was such an odd sensation that he stared at her for the length of it.

            Nymphadora Tonks looked at him, mildly impressed, when she learned of his assignment to penetrate the Werewolfs Allied Revolution (W.A.R.).  It was such an odd sensation that he couldn’t take his eyes away from hers.

            Nymphadora Tonks pulled a face and lightly punched his arm when he called her “Nymphadora.”  It was such an odd sensation that he did it from then on.

            Nymphadora Tonks sat with him at meals when she stayed for dinner at Grimmauld Place, even campaigning for the seat when it was not immediately granted.  It was such an odd sensation that he could barely talk to anyone else.

            Nymphadora Tonks brushed his hand with her own too many times for it to be an accident.  It was such an odd sensation that he turned and asked her why.

            “It’s about time you asked, Remus,” she told him with a wide smile.  “You’re usually pretty chatty when you see me.  Or do I have to be your Auror tail for you to want to talk to me?”

            A long lost smirk graced his face as he came to understand.  “One was you?  Or…they _all_ were you?”

            “One hundred and fifty-seven separate disguises,” Tonks told him, sounding amused and mildly annoyed.  “You strolled right up to every single one and struck up a conversation.  About the twenty-fifth time I marched along your street in a completely different persona and you starting chatting merrily at me, I decided you must be the friendliest bloke in England or you had truly wicked sense of humor.  Not to mention a real eye for law enforcement officials.”

            “Old habits,” Remus told her.  “Constant vigilance!”  Tonks laughed at his extremely mediocre impersonation of Alastor Moody.  It was such an odd sensation, Remus knew he would forever be making lousy jokes in her presence.

            “Seeing you with everyone else, especially once I started visiting Headquarters,” Tonks continued, “I knew that it had to be the latter.”

            “Old habits,” Remus told her.  “Marauders code!”

            Tonks smiled.  “It is nice to find a cousin I could admire,” she said of Sirius, nodding that she at least recognized who he was trying to impersonate.

            “Sirius is certainly worth that,” Remus agreed.  “Despite anything he might say.”

            They talked for four hours before either of them even thought of checking their watches.  It was such an odd sensation, that Remus went to her whenever he wanted to talk to someone from then on.

            But the oddest thing that Nymphadora Tonks did, far beyond her clumsiness or changing appearance or inexplicable devotion to him, and the most intoxicating to Remus Lupin was the fact that she made that terrible memory of the Morning After stop appearing whenever he closed his eyes.  The return of Sirius had not done that.  Becoming a mentor to Harry had not done that.  Time had not accomplished this feat.  Nymphadora Tonks did.

            Remus Lupin did not forget.  He did not forget that he had killed his first wife.  He did not forget how badly he had assumed the husband and father role before.  That was why he did not agree to marry her, why he pushed her away.  But he stopped seeing that horrible moment with every second, and that was enough for him to forget for a moment of weakness that lasted through their wedding what the cost of being a werewolf’s bride truly was.

            The moment that he leaned down to kiss her as her husband for the first time, the second that he closed his eyes as his lips met hers, the memory flooded back to him in such clarity that it might as well have never left.  From then on, it was always perched on his eyelids and often fluttered across his open eyes.  It had been one thing with Marissa.  She had been almost dead already, she had been dying when he married her, and they would not have been able to have children.

            Tonks was young and healthy and deserved someone whole.

            And Remus had a new respect for James Potter.  To have a wife on the front lines, in the thick of a battle, was an almost unendurable torture.  Remus Lupin knew what it was to have a dying wife, what it was to have a wife putting herself in constant danger, what it was to have a captured and tortured wife, and he knew what it was to have a dead wife.  But none of that could prepare him for having a wife throwing herself into the midst of combat, with curses flying about her in every direction and no hope of coming to her aid or protection in the fray.  It could not prepare him for having to leave her fighting her cousin while he pursued another objective in the skies above Little Whinging.

            It had been one thing with Marissa.  He hadn’t been the one who painted a giant target on her forehead.  But now he was the reason that Voldemort’s greatest and most deadly lieutenant, save perhaps only Severus Snape, wanted to kill Nymphadora as much as she wanted to provide Voldemort with Harry Potter.

            It had been one thing with Mundungus.  He was broken beyond repair by his sister’s death, and he had never needed a father figure with Marissa to be his sister and mother.  Their child would be his responsibility, their child would be his.  Even if he had adopted and raised Mundungus, he would not have been the son of a werewolf.

            Harry Potter knocked enough sense into him that he knew he would not run away from the woman who had made him whole again and the child he had to protect.  He had known once, had sworn by the belief, that every moment was precious no matter what the next would bring.  He had trusted in the concept that he would not trade a second of the time that he had with Marissa (and Mundungus, and all of the Gryffindor Six) even to spare himself and them the horrible conclusion.  He had forgotten after sixteen years of solid torture every time he blinked, every time he slept, and every time he closed his eyes for a moment of rest only to be greeted with the horrifying images of the Morning After.

            Tonks had come out of her room at her parents house when he turned up on their doorstep.  “Good, you’re not dead.”  Then she turned to leave again.

            He caught her and tried to apologize and explain.   She would not listen, but only yelled at him that he had _left_ until he shouted the truth he had always withheld from her, “I’ve been married before!”

            That shocked her into silence.  Remus filled it with all of the things that he should have told her from the very beginning.  He hadn’t because he never spoke of them and because once she made the memory disappear, he was afraid that mentioning Marissa would bring it back.

            He told her in a long night until the sun rose behind them about the girl who had befriended him on the train, of her devotion to her younger brother, of the Prank War and the days of the Marauders, of her relationship with Snape, of her Muggle illness, of his care for her, of their whirlwind courtship, of their engagement and marriage, of their mission into the depth of darkness, of her capture and the Potters’ distrust.  He told his wife of the son his first wife had wanted him to adopt and care for, the conman Mundungus Fletcher that had ruined himself instead.  He told her how Mundungus had refused to see him once she had died.

            Then Remus Lupin told her what he saw every time he closed his eyes.  

            He told her how he had killed, ripped apart and destroyed, the dizzy rebel prefect he had loved since he was eleven years old.  He told her how he had failed her brother.  He told her that he had already killed one wife and failed one son.

            Nymphadora took his hand and brought it to rest on her stomach, where a hard, tight ball in the midst of her formerly soft abdomen betrayed the presence of a werewolf’s child.  “You will not be the death of me, Remus Lupin, and you will be a father to my son or daughter.”

            “How can you know that?” Remus shook his head at her youngness.  “After what I’ve just told you, how can that be what you say?”

            “Because I know you, Remus Lupin, and you have never made the same mistake twice.”

            The baby is beautiful and whole, despite Remus’s fears that it would be as unfinished and incomplete as he had been.  The baby wipes away the memory again and pushes out the thousand deaths Tonks had died in his mind.  The baby brings hope to Remus Lupin for the first time in a very long time.

            At the Battle of Hogwarts, fate proves at last kind to Remus Lupin.  He dies a few moments before, rather than after, his second wife.  He is not forced to endure the sight of her broken and lifeless body.  However, he has only a second to greet his grinning first wife in Beyond before his second pops up by his side.  He admires Marissa’s ever-present brass to smile and hug Dora immediately.  He admires Dora’s composure in accepting it, but the truth is that he is mostly relieved to be called to support Harry Potter in his moment of need.

            But he knows that, despite the awkwardness of the moment when his two wives stand face to face, from that point on he will never again be half a man.  Perhaps it is the effect of dying, and perhaps it is the sight of both women who made him whole standing together.  Perhaps that’s all tosh and Remus Lupin never really was less than a whole man except in his own mind.  Nothing would surprise him much at this point.  That is why he is so wise and accepting with Harry Potter.  He is finally able to act as a parent and guide to a young man in trouble.

            Leaving his wives to get acquainted or whatever they were going to do now that they were all dead together, Remus walks with the loyal Marauders and Lily and Harry Potter through the Forbidden Forest, talking of his son Teddy and how death feels and the paternal pride they all feel for the Boy Who Lived but is willing to die.  He muses that all of the Gryffindor Six had to die to bring this moment about, and he knows that the answer to his desperate question was yes.  Creating this magnificent boy, paving his way, helping him survive and grow into this man, is worth every sacrifice they have made.

            And not because he has the power to defeat Voldemort.  Because he exists: what the Marauders always could have been, with the added addition of Lily’s sacrifice and determination and Marissa’s desperate need to protect those she loved.  And yes, he is the savior of the wizarding world.  Who else would it be?  This boy so much love and death went into creating is the weapon that, at last, Voldemort will underestimate and impale himself upon.

            That is worth their sacrifice.


	13. Dumbledore: The Reason I Watched You

**Chapter Twelve**

**The Reason I Watched You**

_In your eyes, I am wise._

They caught his eye from the very beginning.  They tended to do that.

            His first Sorting Ceremony as Headmaster of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry had been one series of disasters after another, and they had been laughing the whole way – the root of the trouble and the masterminds of the mayhem.  Only one thing had been clear throughout: the six new Gryffindors would be the ones to watch for that year.

            They had marked themselves from the very beginning, but even if they hadn’t made such a spectacular entrance, Albus Dumbledore probably would have kept an eye on them.  How could he not watch: a girl of eleven forced to take the place of her mother, equal, for the moment, to the burden; another young girl who had survived a Dementor attack with deep, irreversible scars; a werewolf who was just beginning to learn what it would mean for his life; a daring boy who laughed to break family tradition, unaware of all that he stood to lose; a boy capable of helping two people he barely knew and did not befriend immediately afterwards, not to mention talking Minerva McGonagall out of punishing them; and a charming boy secretly afraid of all that he stood to lose, who could inspire the loyalty of them all.  Of course Dumbledore watched, even before they drew his eyes.  

            Those seven years were quite a show.  In a world growing steadily darker outside of the protected walls of his school, the “Gryffindor Six” were a beacon of light and hope.  Even more comforting, to the old headmaster with the weight of the world on his shoulders, they were not looking to him to solve the world’s problems or even their own.  They were do-it-yourselfers, through and through.  They seemed to trust only each other in the wide world.  It got them into a lot of trouble, of course, but it was a relief for Albus Dumbledore to whom the rest of the world turned for answers and solutions.

            They brought light to everyone: the way that they loved each other, their devotion to each other, the way that they held together when the darkness broke through Dumbledore’s protections.  It gave people hope to watch them, hope that Voldemort’s presence did not have to poison everything in the wizarding world.  Dumbledore delighted more than anyone else to watch each new strike in the Prank War of first year, their tour of the children’s hospital to meet Lily’s other extended family, and the way that their laughter burst through the dark clouds that surrounded him day and night as the war steadily escalated.

            Dumbledore watched them so closely that he saw much more than they guessed.  What frightened him were the things that he missed.

            As closely as he watched them, Albus Dumbledore did not see any sign of Jerome Fletcher’s abuse until Marissa lifted her hair to show him the bruise.  Only then did he notice that last January she had walked with a limp after returning from Christmas holidays and that she always wore long-sleeve sweaters for two weeks after Easter holidays, even in third year when it was unseasonably warm.  It infuriated Dumbledore that he had missed it, and that she had not come to him earlier, because he could have saved her and her brother from hell that much sooner.  But she trusted only the Gryffindor Six to help her save her brother.

            As closely as he watched them, Albus Dumbledore did not know that Lily Evans had been trying to move heaven and earth to get her mother admitted to St. Mungo’s Hospital until after Lily collapsed into sobs at hearing of her mother’s death.  Only then did he realize that the flurry of owls she had sent and received over the past two months had born official seals and always seemed to bring bad news.  Only then did he remember her clutching a copy of _The Quibbler_ in gratitude and hope.  He obtained a copy and learned that Lily Evans had, in desperation, asked Xenophilius Lovegood to print a bitter tirade against the Ministry for covering up a Dementor attack and refusing to treat its victim, leaving her to rot in a Muggle hospital when she could recover in St. Mungo’s.  It tortured Dumbledore to see her grief, because he could have prevented it.  He would have said what Lovegood wrote, but it would have come from a respected and feared wizard rather than a tabloid publisher.  But she had not thought to ask him for his help, though she appealed to every contact of the Marauders and even her mother’s favorite magazine publisher.

            As closely as he watched them, Albus Dumbledore did not know how deeply Sirius Black was hurt when he left his family until he concealed his brother’s involvement in the Willow Incident.

 

‘`’

 

            What possessed Regulus Black to be running toward the Whomping Willow over and over again Dumbledore was never certain.  His best guess was that Severus Snape had told him enough of his suspicions of the Marauders that he decided to get his brother in trouble himself.  Perhaps it was a dare of some kind or perhaps it was because he had always lost the games before they were banned.  Perhaps it was for some other unfathomable teenage reason, but regardless, Regulus Black ran headlong at the Whomping Willow over and over again, getting worse at dodging the branches as he went rather than better.

            “Holy Fiendfyre, Reg!” Sirius Black shouted as he came pelting up the Willow.  “What do you think you are doing?”  He made a few vain attempts to catch or stop his brother.  “Stop it, Reg, you’re going to get yourself killed!”

            “What do you care?” Regulus shouted back, plunging back into the flailing branches.

            Sirius cursed, standing just on the edge of danger.  Dumbledore was seriously considering intervening when Sirius picked up a rock and aimed, in a throw worthy of his best friend, at the knot in the trunk that stopped the limbs of the tree dead.  The one that had been about to lay out Regulus froze instantly, sparing him a night in the Hospital Wing followed by a severe headache in the morning.  His odds might have been worse if the Headmaster hadn’t been walking through the forest and observed the near-injury.

            “How did you do that?” Regulus turned to his brother, just as hostile.

            “What the hell are you doing, Reg?” Sirius demanded again.

            “You threw a rock at that knot in the trunk,” Regulus answered his own question thoughtfully.  “So Snape was right all this time with his paranoid nonsense!  You lot do know how to stop the Whomping Willow!  Just what does that do for you?  Some secret passageway at the base?”

            “Reg, don’t!” Sirius darted forward again to pull his brother physically back away from the Willow again.  “It doesn’t stop the branches for long, you idiot!  Back away, will you, Reg?”  Without waiting to see if Regulus would listen, Sirius yanked him back out of harm’s way.

            “ _Don’t_ call me ‘Reg,’” Regulus said with a fierce glare at Sirius as he jerked out of his grip.  “Don’t even talk to me.  Don’t pretend that you care about any of us anymore.   That ship has sailed.”  With a final glare, Regulus marched back to the castle and left his brother staring, heartbrokenly, after him.

 

‘`’

 

            Even with the look that Sirius held as his brother walked away, Albus Dumbledore didn’t really understand the depth of Sirius’s loss and his need for his family until after the Willow Incident.  When Sirius Black took all the blame for telling Severus Snape how to get past the Whomping Willow, never so much as even hinting at having told Regulus, Dumbledore finally understood.  Perhaps he blamed himself just the same, not protecting Regulus from the knowledge that could have gotten him killed if he hadn’t been bright enough to ignorantly pass it along to Severus Snape.  As time passed, Dumbledore wondered if even Sirius remembered what had really happened anymore or if he repressed the memory that he had protected his brother.  In any case, Albus Dumbledore finally understood what those unmailed letters, unfinished greetings, and attempts to save his brother really meant.  It saddened him, because even if he had known in time, Albus Dumbledore doubted that he could have prevented Sirius Black’s pain, even if he had been brave enough to tell him his own.

            There were limits to what he could do, and for all they were among the first to believe that to their detriment, it also made them his hope.  Deep in his bones, Albus Dumbledore had always known that he was not meant to destroy Tom Riddle.  So he watched these children who seemed impervious to the darkness around them, who seemed to know that he was not all-powerful and could not solve all of their problems, who looked only to each other, and hoped that they would show him another way.

            As eagerly as he watched them, it was almost two decades later before he realized how Remus Lupin’s recoveries suddenly improved monumentally at the same time that the guilt in his eyes magnified tenfold.  Not until Sirius Black begged for his belief, not until he told him what they had done for Remus, did he realize the significance of their nicknames.  He had thought their collective absence from the Tower was a way of helping to cover Remus’s tracks.  He had not seen that they were helping him much more directly.

            Worse, Albus Dumbledore did not see, until he realized that Remus had not told him their secrets when Sirius Black escaped from Azkaban, how very much he had destroyed his and Remus’s relationship when he made his wife into his most trusted spy.  Marissa had been the only one who really knew what it would mean for her and her husband.  Dumbledore had thought that he understood what he was costing them.  Of course he hadn’t, however closely he watched them at Hogwarts and beyond.  He should have realized that he watched them because there was something he did not understand and could only appreciate in their devotion, something he had never had himself.

            He had thought he saw them so clearly.  After Hogwarts, however, he had seen only what they could do, how useful they could be.  And he had asked what he might not have been able to if he had truly understood what they meant to each other, how fragile that could be, and what it would do to them to lose each other.

 

‘`’

 

            “I assume since you asked Remus to wait outside that you will not want me to tell him once I leave,” Marissa said seriously, regarding Albus Dumbledore gravely from across his desk.  She sat resolute and stubbornly upright in the chair, though his piercing blue eyes could see how tired she was from the effort.

            “I am afraid so, Mrs. Lupin,” Dumbledore replied.  “If you do not accept this mission, I will erase your memory before you leave this office.”

            There was a short pause, then Marissa Lupin shocked him.  “You would not be giving me this assignment if I wasn’t going to die,” she said matter-of-factly.

            “No, I wouldn’t,” Dumbledore replied honestly.  It was the only thing that he could do.  “What I am about to tell you is no more than suspicion, but it is the key to everything.  I have enough evidence to convince myself that I am right, but gathering even that has been terribly dangerous.”

            “And you need an expendable pair of hands to risk?” she said.  The slight bitterness in her voice was as craftily hidden as her exhaustion, but Dumbledore saw it all the same.  He wondered if she meant him to see a hint of both.  He had never fully been able to tell with Marissa Fletcher.

            “The danger I speak of is detection,” Dumbledore replied.  “Though the personal dangers are certainly not inconsiderable, the true disaster would be if Lord Voldemort ever learned that I suspect him and am taking steps to seek it.”

            “Well, you have taken precautions,” Marissa said, again with her slight bitterness expertly hidden.  “Perhaps you could tell me what you mean so we can stop speaking in code.”

            “I am afraid that will never be the case with this mission,” Dumbledore told her.  Then he told her about horcruxes and how he suspected that Voldemort was employing one to preserve his immortality.

            She had been instantly useful.  “I think Professor Slughorn might know something about this, Headmaster,” she told him.  She explained how Lily had been browsing in the Restricted Section searching for an old potions book for a research project when she came across a terrible sounding book.  She had been telling Marissa about it in Potions one day, and Professor Slughorn’s reaction had been…well, guilty as well as a ridiculous overreaction.  Not only the partial, modified memory of Slughorn’s chat with Tom Riddle but Riddle’s likely source of information had been unearthed simply from a single debriefing with her.

            After that, she set out to find where Voldemort would have hidden it.

            This was before Dumbledore knew with such certainty that Tom Riddle would have no associates, no trusted allies.  A few years down the road, he would have thought then that her search would be fruitless.

            But find something she did.  Dumbledore thought her as mad as Sirius Black did for having tea with Narcissa Malfoy, for he knew that if anything she would only learn traps set to determine her loyalty and ensnare the Order.  She could not help being closely aligned with many of its most public members, for all she kept her own public face well away from something that would compromise her perceived neutrality.

            But she found two somethings, one with the Malfoys and one with the Blacks, and Dumbledore felt cold.  So he sent her back, to fish for more in the Darkness.

            He should have seen how much he was costing her.  When he asked her, his neutral agent, to deliver the Philosopher’s Stone to Gringotts, he was forced to see what he was really asking of her.  She hid in the crowd, giving no hint of the vital package secured under her cloak, as the battle raged around her.  She dared not attack the Death Eaters who hurt and killed those around her for fear of jeopardizing her more important mission.  That was, in a nutshell, what he asked of her every step of the way.

            The Gryffindor Six were not the ideal people to ask to do such a thing.  They were also not the ideal people to understand someone else doing it.

            “How am I suppose to explain that, Dumbledore?” she ranted later, pacing back and forth across his office with more energy than he had seen her display during any of their other interviews.  “If you could have seen the way they looked at me!  They know Remus and I keep our money in a Muggle bank, and there was Peter asking why I hadn’t been joining in the fighting!  And I couldn’t tell them what I was really doing, what must they think of me?”

            “They were quite busy,” Dumbledore offered.  “And they know that your magical powers are waning.”

            “Waning!” Marissa broke in, for the first time speaking over Albus Dumbledore,   “Not gone, and they know it!”  Then Marissa put her hands in front of her face and stopped dead.  She made a strangled sound of neither anger nor frustration nor physical pain.  “I can’t lose them, Dumbledore.  Please, are you so sure that I can’t tell them?”

            “Mrs.  Lupin,” he began, calmly.

            “Not everything!” she began quickly, taking her seat and leaning forward eagerly.  “Just what I tell Remus, that I’m your spy, that I’m working for you, that I really am in the Order.”  There were tears in her eyes, drowning in turn in fear.

            “And then they will ask why you did not tell them about an attack or a mission you must have known about,” Dumbledore said calmly.  “And what will you say?”

            “That’s it a larger mission, something you need me to do,” Marissa said, leaned even further forward, her hands now on his desk, reaching slightly toward him.

            “And when they ask what it is?”

            “I can’t tell them, but it is important,” she replied promptly, eagerly.

            “So they talk about it amongst themselves,” Dumbledore said quietly.

            “But only that!  They’re not stupid, Dumbledore!”

            “Mrs. Lupin,” he tried a different tactic, “surely what you had with them is not so weak as to fade away so easily, in one afternoon.”

            “It’s not unbreakable, Dumbledore,” she said, withdrawing her hand from his desk.

            “That I know,” he told her seriously.  “It has broken.”

            “What?”

            “Someone very close to you indeed has turned,” Dumbledore said quietly.  “I have learned this from my own spies.   Some of the details that Lord Voldemort knows about the Potters, in particular, could only come from inside their circle.”

            There was a long pause before Marissa spoke again.  “They’re going to think that it was me,” she told him.  “Not immediately, not because of one afternoon, but they will eventually think that it is me.”  Marissa drew herself up and wiped her eyes.  “But I cannot tell them, all the same.”  She looked up at him with fire in her eyes, and told him in a voice that no longer concealed her anger, “You will find out who has betrayed them.  You will not let him hurt them.  He will not have free reign to destroy them because they think it’s me.  You put them at risk.  You will save them.”  Then she stood to leave.

            The only worse encounter was the one they had had three months before she died.  She had finished giving her report and stood to leave.  It quickly became her custom to exchange no pleasantries with him after that last conversation.

            “Mrs. Lupin,” he stopped her at the door.  “I am sorry, for all that this is costing you, but you know the importance of your work.”  He missed her as she had been, the dizzy prefect who had ruled Gryffindor house during her time at Hogwarts, and the strong, aloof woman she had turned herself into in the process of her work was a poor substitute.

            She did not answer him immediately or directly.  “I understand that you knew Gellert Grindewald when you were both young, that you were friends.  Bathilda Bagshot has been filling Lily’s head will all kinds of stories, including several about the two of you, in the Potters’ isolation at Godric’s Hollow,” she told him in an even voice.

            She turned back to look at him for a long moment.  “Do not let the fact that you know what it is to duel and imprison an old friend delude you into thinking that you know how I feel.”  For a moment the bitterness and anger faded from her eyes and there was only sorrow at her loss there, along with a few buried tears.  “Miss Bagshot also babysits for Lily now.  That job used to be mine.”  Then she turned and walked out of his office.  It was her way of telling him that he had not kept up his end of the bargain.

 

‘`’

 

            She was right.  He had missed how fragile something that looked so strong could be.  The most powerful spell could be cut off by one blink from the casting wizard.  He had blinked with little Peter.  And he missed Peter Pettigrew completely, however closely he watched them, however very closely he watched for the traitor especially after her challenge and even more after the prophecy.

            He did not realize until he read her message in _The Inferno_ that she had taken the job of finding the traitor upon herself instead, no longer trusting him to handle such a delicate matter on her behalf.  But there it was, her warning to the Potters.

            When he had told Sirius Black that it was a masterpiece of code-creation, Dumbledore had not been exaggerating.  He also had not explained the point that made it truly “ingenious.”  It was a double message, with the first half for the Potters.  The lines it referenced were meant to be translated by the Potters by flipping to the appropriate page in this particular copy of the book.  The message to him would lie, as ever, under the same page, line and word numbers of the original.  Her communications always ran such, a series of numbers to reference lines in the original copies of pre-decided upon books, then a false decoder key like “B4.”  The really brilliant part was when the translation, using a plausible key, was disinformation or even a non-vital piece of the message.

            But Dumbledore did not understand her message as quickly as the Potters did.  It took him years to piece all of the bits together.  What was more, it took the help of another Potter.

            Dumbledore had missed so much about the Gryffindor Six, from the abuse to the cries for help to the depth of their suffering to their fatal weakness, and it made him determined not to miss anything with Harry James Potter.

            Dumbledore watched closely enough to see the abuse of Harry Potter that he had missed with his godmother.  It was worse than before, because he was still helpless in the face of it, still powerless to remove Harry Potter from the trouble that he had placed him in himself.  Dumbledore saw the disintegration of family ties and was as useless to repair the damage as he had been with Harry’s godfather.  He watched more closely than Harry could ever have dreamed how Petunia Dursley punished him for his mother’s failures, many of which he could have prevented, and how his aunt attempted to protect the son she ruined instead.

            Dumbledore studied Harry in his first year at Hogwarts, wandering if he would follow the path of his parents and their friends.  Would he arrive in an explosion of mayhem and ride the fall out for months?  No, he was an ordinary first year to all but the most watchful eyes of Albus Dumbledore, who saw the friend that he made and the life that he turned his back on twice in one night: first, when Draco Malfoy extended his hand and, second, when he was Sorted into Gryffindor despite the presence of Voldemort’s soul within his own.  He chose, like Sirius Black, which side to join before he knew all of the ramifications.

            Then he set out to uncover secrets, like his father, and reached out to friends in danger like his mother.  He had his father and his father’s friends’ thirst for uncovering secrets, though the ones he chose were considerably more grave and dangerous than those the Marauders sought.  He had the same deepest desires, for family, as all of the Gryffindor Six.  He had two friends as loyal to him as the group that produced him.

            The big difference was that, for answers, he turned to Albus Dumbledore.  He trusted and listened to his counsel.  He simply asked.  Harry Potter looked to Albus Dumbledore in the way he could convince none of the Gryffindor Six to do.  It was exactly what he had hoped for, but it was a very different gift than the one that had drawn him to the original Potters and their friends.  He felt the weight settle on him again.

            The next year Harry Potter found what he had not been able to find in eleven years of searching, even with Marissa’s message to guide him.  Harry Potter found and destroyed the first horcrux of Tom Riddle, without even having to know what it was.  When he had left the boy on whom he had known long ago he would pin all of his hopes, long before he had such confidence in him, he took out the book Mrs. Lupin had sent to him and gazed at the piece of paper he had tucked inside of it bearing the translation of the encrypted message she had left him:

 

**Because it is a love story.**

**"for Branca d'Oria never died, but eats and drinks and sleeps and puts on clothes"**

**"That was one of the seven kings who laid siege to Thebes and held, and seems to hold God in disdain and seems to esteem Him lightly"**

**Many tell all to those beneath them, thinking blindly that it is as safe as houses on their breasts.**

**“‘Let Malacoda go,’ so one moved, the rest standing still, and came to him, saying: ‘What good will it to him?  Thinkest thou, Malacod,’ said my Master.”**

**"A Galeotto was the book and he that wrote it"**

**Seven years have I loved you, but those seven years must crack before peace can come.  My suffering is what it took for the truth to be known, do not grieve it.  Carry with you only the memories that sustain you.**

**"and were I not hindered by the stone which subdues my proud neck so that I must hold my face down I would look at this man who still lives and who is not named"**

            He finally began to understand parts of her message.  Of course, the first encoded reference was meant to tell him that the message concerned horcruxes, referring to a man with a broken soul still alive.  The mention of “seven kings” laying siege to Thebes was a reference to the possibility they had discussed, when they found a second potential horcrux, of Riddle using as many as seven pieces of his soul.  The most powerful magical number, they had pondered.  So this was a guess, like their guess of the number, and something that would need to be confirmed.  That was why she had not made an appointment to discuss the matter more openly.  She did not yet know for certain, but she could not take this speculation with her to the grave.

            Dumbledore had not known for certain if the original sentences were meant for him, but now he saw that the reference to “houses on their breasts” did not only mean the protection charm of the Fidelius on the cottage in Godric’s Hollow, protected by their Secret Keeper’s heart.  It was a reference to house elves, who often wore their family crests on togas around their chests, particularly at Hogwarts.  With the next two lines, Dumbledore should have known that a deceptive Book was in the possession of the Malfoys (Malacoda and Malfoy both translating, ultimately, to “bad faith”), and the means of learning more: Dobby.  Dobby had been drawn, however, to Harry Potter instead.  At least he understood, at last, why Marissa’s message had asked him not to press the prosecution of the Malfoys all those years ago.  She had feared that this potential horcrux would be forever lost if it fell completely out of the Malfoys’ possession.  Perhaps she was right.

            Dumbledore did not forget how the house elves had led her where their masters would not have allowed her to go.  It helped him uncover much of the truth of the murder surrounding Helga Hufflepuff’s goblet.  It also led him to insist that Kreacher be treated with kindness when they returned to Grimmauld Place.  While he stood by everything he said to Sirius for the pure principle of the matter, it did not escape his notice that Marissa Fletcher had also investigated the Blacks and found a potentially compromising object.  Perhaps it was even the “stone which subdues [the] proud neck” of “this man who still lives and is not named,” to which she had alluded in this last message.  Kreacher did, indeed, seem to have spoken to Marissa Lupin on many occasions and to have a kind of respect for her.  Nothing compared to his devotion to his masters, but it was enough to think that he may know more than he would tell Dumbledore.

            So Dumbledore made certain that Harry and Kreacher remained tied together.

            The last part of the message that Dumbledore learned to accept was the last original sentence, in which Marissa offered him forgiveness.  It was meant, obviously, to reassure Lily and James that she understood why they had not trusted her and forgive them for not seeing her on her deathbed.  However, Dumbledore hoped that she was also forgiving the Headmaster who had demanded that she sacrifice their trust.  He did not know, however, if she would have forgiven him if she had lived to learn that the Potters had been murdered because of their ill-placed trust.

            Remus Lupin forgave him, at least enough to work at Hogwarts.  But as Dumbledore watched the relationship between Harry and Remus more closely than he had watched any other relationship of Remus Lupin’s, he saw that Remus blamed himself all these years later more than any other person, even his wife.  He was glad that at least that bond had been spared.

            Likewise, Dumbledore delighted to see the bond slowly growing between Harry and the professor who did not tell him the right he had to such a connection.  He watched the now much more skillful Remus Lupin once again presenting himself to a Potter, just as desperate for approval and just as uncertain as ever.  He watched Harry’s fury at discovering the story of Sirius Black, his grim determination to kill him fading gradually in the face of his friends’ distress, though still present.

            He watched as Harry took a risk so grave he doubted he fully comprehended its danger for his godfather, and how Hermione Granger took the risk in full knowledge of its ramifications, for Harry.

            In Harry Potter’s fourth year, he was confronted, unexpectedly, with what he had missed.  This time it was not something that Harry had done, some secret that Harry had hidden from his watchful gaze.  It was the plot surrounding Harry.  Until the moment that Dumbledore snatched the fourth slip of parchment out of the Goblet of Fire, he did not know that the forces of Darkness were once again making a play for Harry Potter, a fully deliberate one this time.

            Dumbledore missed much that year, caught as his attention was with the other rumors and the dark dance he was doomed to play with Tom Riddle.  He missed Barty Crouch Jr.’s impersonation of Alastor Moody and the help that Harry was being given in the tasks of the tournament.  He was distracted by the danger and the obvious plot.  He still saw all of Harry Potter’s struggles and victories, large and small, still saw enough to know him a boy with the makings of a great man, but by the end of year he knew what it was, once again, to miss something important even in the children that he watched so closely, with such delight.  He knew what it was to cause them pain.

            Albus Dumbledore learned again how to learn of a victory he could not have achieved from the mouth of Potter.  He smiled to think of Lily’s lingering protection, her considerable power and will to protect.  He triumphed to think back on how the six friends he had watched had taught Lily, who could have been damaged by the lack of obvious love left in her family, how to wield it with such unique skill and power.

            But like with those six friends he had studied when he was a new Headmaster, Albus Dumbledore had much more misery to watch so closely.  He had to watch Delores Umbridge torture Harry Potter.  He watched him fight back with astounding rebelliousness and spirit, worthy of the parents who had preceded him.  He watched him spread the same light of hope and truth that the Potters had been in their time at Hogwarts.

            He even watched Harry Potter build an army and make new friends in what his parents had believed was The Chocolate Room, the Room of Requirement that had known so well how to bring the Gryffindor Six together.

            He also had the pleasure of saving Harry Potter in a way that none of the Gryffindor Six would have allowed him.  He saw the name that Harry had chosen for his band of followers.  The Marauders would never have named their underground organization, “Dumbledore’s Army.”  Because Harry trusted him, he was at least able to save him from expulsion.

            Even dislodged from Hogwarts, Dumbledore watched Harry more closely than the boy could have imagined, but there was a time delay now.  He could not prevent Harry from falling into the trap.

            Dumbledore was forced to watch Harry Potter reel from losing a loved one the way he had watched with Harry’s mother and his father, as well as his godmother and godfather, helpless to ease his pain and in full knowledge that he could have stopped it if he had known, if he had acted, in time.  This time it was him who hadn’t told Harry the vital piece of information, rather than Lily withholding her struggle from him.

            As Harry yelled at him, Dumbledore sat back in the somber knowledge that Harry had a great deal more to yell at him about – and not just what he ended up telling him later in the evening.  When he was pacing, Dumbledore could almost see Harry’s godmother marking the same steps – furious that Dumbledore was putting her friends and Harry’s parents in danger to keep his secrets.

            No, Harry was not nearly angry enough at him.

 

_In your eyes, I wanted to see a reason for your trust.  I wanted you to look at me in the eyes and know that I deserved the blind trust so few withheld.  But that was the moment that blind trust faded from your eyes, and I knew I would give anything to have it return._

 

            It was to return, sooner than Dumbledore could have imagined, but the moment that it had faded had been truly terrible retribution for all of the things that Dumbledore had done to break Harry Potter’s trust.  He had grown spoiled, having the implicit trust of Harry after having to earn it every step of the way with his parents and their friends.

            Dumbledore pledged, there and then, to learn from all of his mistakes, with Harry Potter and the group that had splintered in order to protect him.  He changed the policies of a lifetime because of the broken faith in Harry Potter’s eyes, the eyes of Lily Potter whom he had killed with his secrets.

 

‘`’

 

            “Sir, am I allowed to tell Ron and Hermione everything you’ve told me?”

            Albus Dumbledore looked steadily at Harry Potter.  He had answered that question once before, to a young woman in many ways this boy’s equal in suffering, whose friends were the equal of Harry’s trio in many ways.

            He had answered her no.

            She had kept her word.

            By keeping the secret, she had protected it.  She had taken her knowledge with her to the grave.  She left behind an indecipherable clue that even he could barely understand as the only hint that she had known what only Dumbledore in the wide world seemed to suspect.  He had had years to track down memories in secret and gather evidence and begin to uncover the places the horcruxes would be hidden.  By keeping the secret, she had given Harry and Dumbledore the chance to destroy him.

            But it had also broken the bonds that she had so carefully forged.  It had destroyed the family she had created from the ashes of her own.  The secret had led the Potters to trust the wrong man, ultimately to place their lives in the hands of their betrayer.  It had led to her murder and to that of the Potters, to Harry Potter’s life of suffering.  It had led to the pain and despair of Remus Lupin and to the destruction of Mundungus Fletcher.  It had led to the suffering of Sirius Black and to the death of Lily and James Potter.

            But Marissa Fletcher’s sacrifice had allowed Harry Potter the chance to know what Lord Voldemort did not dare tell even his most trusted followers – what he had never hinted at in the obscurest way since he was sixteen years old.

            “Yes, I think Mr. Weasley and Miss Granger have proved themselves trustworthy.  But Harry, I am going to ask you to ask them not to repeat any of this to anybody else.  It would not be a good idea if word got around how much I know, or suspect, about Lord Voldemort’s secrets.”

            As Harry made this assurance, a grim thought settled on Dumbledore, sending a shooting pain through his wounded arm.  If he had told Marissa Fletcher the same thing, would Lily and James Potter be dead now?  Would Marissa have died with the burden of having those she loved most in the world believe her a traitor?  Would Remus have been alone?  Would Sirius have suffered?  Would Sirius have died?

            And Harry?

            Did this repay the damage that he had done to Harry when he had given the opposite answer to Marissa Fletcher?  Could such a debt ever be repaid?

            Which time had he made the terrible mistake?  Only time would tell.

            “Too late, Harry!  You shall hear the story another time.  Good night.”  Perhaps he would find the answer another time.  Perhaps not.  Perhaps he did not deserve one.

            “Good night, sir.”

            Truly, he did not deserve to recover Harry Potter’s trust as quickly as he did.

 

‘`’

 

            Harry had taken the mission far more calmly than his godmother, but she had known just what she stood to lose.

            Dumbledore had had to watch the group that he loved, that had fascinated him for years, splinter because of the same secret he had passed to Harry Potter.

            That was why Dumbledore entrusted Harry’s chosen allies, allowing a conspiracy at the price of absolute secrecy.  He knew now the power and light of such a friendship as the trio of heroes had, like the Gryffindor Six before them.  That is why Dumbledore ensured that Ron had the Deluminator, because he also knew the soul-shattering pain of that bond breaking.  He knew that the only thing more tragic than such a bond breaking is it breaking unnecessarily.

 

_In your eyes, I am a protector._

 

            The Gryffindor Six had never seen him that way, but their heir did.  If only he knew what Dumbledore had been unable to protect.  He was determined not to make those fatal mistakes again.

            But there was still a mission.

            Six horcruxes, six members of the Gryffindor Six.  All would have to be destroyed before the War could end.

            And the seventh horcrux, the heir of the Gryffindor Six.  The one for whom all of the Gryffindor Six had sacrificed their lives and the one who would destroy all of the horcruxes.  If destiny was in any way kind, this one horcrux, this last remnant of the friends who had been so bright and beautiful and loving, could be purged of evil, yet survive.

            Perhaps it was that that made him think of his old obsession, the passion he had shared with his friend so close they could have been soulmates.  The bond that had broken after it shattered his family.

            Three Hallows, three rightful bearers.  Tom Marvolo’s heirloom ring, Dumbledore’s spoils of battle, and Harry’s father’s cloak.  Two cost the death of family, one the end of a friendship.  Only one of the bearers had treasured his Hallow, the others had not been so careful.  Perhaps, if Harry could pick up the others, the discarded and misused, he could be the member of the trio to survive – the member of the seven to live.

            Even if Dumbledore had none of the other thousands of reason to hope that this was true, he would still hope it was so because he owed that much to the Gryffindor Six, whom he had cost so much in the First War.

            The Gryffindor Six that had so intrigued him had never seen him as their protector.  He was the man who punished them at Hogwarts, sent them out into battle in the War, cost them everything they held dear, and misjudged them at nearly every turn that mattered.  The one time any of them had asked him for protection – when Mrs. Lupin demanded that he protect the Potters he had endangered – he had failed them.

            So Albus Dumbledore protected Harry Potter.  He became the protector the Gryffindor Six had not seen, the protector they had deserved he would be for their heir, the protector like they had been for each other.

            The protector that could have saved them, if he had known, if he had guessed, if he had been willing to sacrifice the War Effort to save their friendship.

            He couldn’t have made any other decision, really, given the circumstances, but he owed them this much: he would watch over their son.


End file.
